


The Fault in Ourselves

by Cedar



Category: Divergent (Movies), Divergent - All Media Types, Divergent Series - Veronica Roth
Genre: Abuse, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon, Anger, Angst, Blood and Violence, Brothers, Drama, Family, Family Drama, Fist Fights, Gen, Loyalty
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-23
Updated: 2020-02-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:15:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 33,629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21529654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cedar/pseuds/Cedar
Summary: Tobias Eaton is two days from his Choosing Ceremony. He wants to transfer out of Abnegation, but doing so means his younger brother, Caleb, would be left alone with their abusive father, Marcus. Secrets and lies lead Tobias to make a choice that will change the lives of both brothers.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 16





	1. Part 1, Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> First, metaphoracle is an awesome beta reader.
> 
> Second, this AU is inspired by Veronica Roth’s notes about the original draft of Divergent, in which the main character, Tobias, had an adversarial relationship with his father and a brother named Caleb. More here: https://www.goodreads.com/notes/9717320-divergent/3529578-veronica-roth

_The Fault in Ourselves_

Part 1

When school is over, I enter the computer lab for my last day of faction-required community service before my aptitude test.

“Hello, Tobias,” says Katherine, the Erudite woman who organizes the school lab and supervises my service. “I’m glad you’re here. Erudite sent over a couple of computers to add to the lab. Can you get them up and running and install the school software?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I reply. Katherine has a workstation for me in the back of the room. I set my bag down and look at the shipment from Erudite. The computers are still in boxes and need to be assembled. After sitting for hours in class, it feels good to lift the monitors from their boxes and crawl under the table to plug them in. Then I power them on and begin the software installation process.

With two days to go until my Choosing Ceremony, I am almost certain that I will give my blood to Erudite. I’ve enjoyed the time I’ve spent volunteering in the school computer lab, and I think I would like to be a teacher. Abnegation has taught me patience, and I know teachers need more of that than most people. I can easily see myself standing at the front of a classroom, teaching computer science or math or even history in a light blue shirt under a dark blue vest, grading tests after school and tutoring students who need extra help. Teachers work long hours, but I wouldn’t mind that. It’s not like I’m used to having a lot of unstructured time.

Katherine says that she likes working with computers because they don’t think for themselves and only ever do what you tell them to do. I think of the other Abnegation that way, and more than once I wish I could be more like them. They are always so sure of their place and their role, and they never seem to question anything. There are times I feel like I could burst out of my skin with wanting to be elsewhere, doing something completely un-Abnegation. I want to know what I might look like with long hair or wearing black or blue. I want to argue with the Candor kids in my classes not to determine who has the right answer, but just to fight, raise my voice, have an audience. Sometimes I want to run for the sole purpose of feeling the burn in my legs. I study the tattoos and piercings my Dauntless classmates have and wonder what it would be like to choose my pain.

I have learned to live with all of this dissonance because my brother is more important to me than knowing how those scenes of defiance might play out.

Without question, through all our disagreements and my frustrations with how well Caleb is suited to leading a quiet, rule-following Abnegation life, I would do anything for him. But being a good brother, advising and helping and guiding him, is often difficult. I have to push my own wants and needs aside, and that is harder than I can let anyone know. Because sometimes I hate Caleb every bit as much as I love him. Not for who he is, but for not having his best qualities in myself. When he sits calmly as our father cuts his hair, I hate him for being passive. When he helps someone without pausing, expecting nothing in return, I hate him for being so effortlessly perfect. I know none of it is fair to him, but I won’t apologize for the feelings I keep to myself. Selfishness comes in the act, not the thought.

I will tell myself that until I believe it.

The other Abnegation probably think of us as a unit, the Eaton boys, not caring which of us is which. In a way I guess I couldn’t blame them, both of us slim with dark hair in identical gray uniforms. No one ever stops to notice that we have different eyes, different jawlines, different voices. To want anyone to see us as individuals is too self indulgent. It would be the epitome of selfishness to ask others to acknowledge that Caleb is better at math where I excel with computers. That the religious services we attend every week make Caleb more faithful and me more skeptical. That he never questions anything that is asked of him, and that I hate him sometimes for it.

And yet.

The Abnegation who are most like Caleb know how imperfect our hearts can be and are never discouraged by it. They believe and show that dedication to selflessness means a better life for everyone. I know I can never give my father’s fellow council members an honest answer on the rare occasions they see me and ask me how I am, but they truly want to know when they ask. If I am anything but fine, they want to know what they can give of themselves to make me better. Caleb shows this to me every day without even trying. Because of that, I can never hate him for more than a minute. He makes me see the best in our faction, makes me want to be just like him.

After my service hours are done for the day, I say goodbye to Katherine. She tells me she’ll miss having me in the lab, and that whichever faction I choose, she hopes it brings me fulfillment. I want more time to myself, so I choose to walk home from school today. I think best in these times, listening to the white noise created by the chaos of trains and buses and people.

Every time I sit quietly at school, not because that’s what Abnegation children do but because a recent beating from Marcus means it would hurt too much to laugh or play, I think about telling one of the Amity counselors at school the truth. Then I think days, weeks, months into the future and realize I can’t. Even if someone did believe me, Marcus is too trusted, too revered. It’s unlikely anyone would do anything to him. He is the leader of the faction entrusted with governing everyone else. It would be my word against his, and I can’t risk the safety and reputation of an entire faction on a gamble like that. If someone did believe me, it would be the perfect chance for Erudite or Candor to gain control of the city government and shape it to their wants rather than everyone else’s needs. The leaders who are true servants, truly selfless, don’t deserve that.

I turn my choices of Erudite and Abnegation over and over. If I left to become a teacher, that act alone wouldn’t change who Caleb is. He would still be selfless. But Caleb won’t choose his faction for another two years. Would two years of having all of Marcus’s attention change him? If Marcus’s outlet for his rage were Caleb, not me, would it empty and destroy all of Caleb’s good traits? I already feel like it’s destroyed some of mine. I can’t think of another reason why I often feel so much anger and frustration instead of the patience and generosity that seem to come easy to everyone else in Abnegation.

The aptitude test will tell me the right answer. All I have to do is trust it.


	2. Chapter 2

“Tobias, we need to talk,” my father says as I am finishing the dishes after dinner. I’m annoyed by his entrance but keep my head down to keep from showing it. I was lost in thought as I scrubbed pans under the hot soapy water. I prefer washing the dishes to cooking, not that I ever get a choice.

I recognize the emotion on my father’s face, though I’ve never seen him express it before. He’s worried. Stern, too, but something has him unsettled.

“Yes, sir.” I shut off the faucet and stack the last of the wet plates in the drying rack. Normally I’d dry them and put them away, but if this were something that could wait, Marcus would have done so. I look around for Caleb but don’t see him. He must be doing his homework. That means he’ll have his bedroom door closed, because he always says he learns best in silence. This timing is deliberate on Marcus’s part.

“Sit,” Marcus orders, pointing to the couch. I almost remain standing just because I want to rebel against something, anything. I fear the consequences of doing so, however, so I obey.

“Your aptitude test is tomorrow.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What have you heard about the administration of the test?”

There have been rumors around school, there are always rumors, but none of them have ever seemed that believable. “Nothing,” I say. “Some kids at school say it hurts, but I don’t believe them.”

“Good. I knew you would be smarter than that.” He paces back and forth in front of the couch. “Now, I need you to listen closely. We are only going to have this conversation once. You must never share with anyone what I’m about to tell you.”

“Not even Caleb?” I’ve never shared anything with my father that Caleb didn’t know.

With a stare of incandescent anger, Marcus stops pacing. He grabs my wrist so hard I think he might fracture a bone, looks right into my eyes, and asks, “Were you listening when I said you were not to tell anyone?”

I stifle a squeak of pain and nod. Only after that does he let me go, pushing me back into the couch. I curl into my seat and fold my hands in my lap. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry. I won’t tell Caleb. Or anyone else.”

I listen to instructions that I know Marcus is forbidden to speak. The secrecy of the aptitude test is closely guarded, even by the Candor. He tells me what choices to make in the test: food, not the knife; save the little girl; sacrifice myself. I am so stunned by his reveal that I can barely reply to any of his questions. As the most trusted leader of the council, if anyone knew what he was telling me right now he could face severe punishment.

I will make these proper choices. I _will_ get an Abnegation result, he tells me. There is no other option.

My thoughts are spinning. I have a thousand questions for Marcus, the least of which is why he thinks it’s so important that I know all this.

 _Because I might not get an Abnegation result_ , I think. _And that would bring shame on Marcus_. Another result is certainly possible. I do well enough in school that an Erudite result wouldn’t be out of the question regardless of whether I have plans to be a teacher. Unlike Marcus, I don’t feel disdain for other factions. When he sneers at what he calls the ridiculous clothing and manners of the Dauntless, I can only figure that they must value their appearance and customs the way he does Abnegation’s. Maybe that’s part of what’s making him so apprehensive: that I can see all the factions as worthy in one way or another even though I know I can only belong to one.

“There is one more thing,” he says, sitting beside me so his face is level with mine. “You may experience the feeling of being in two places at once when you are in the simulation. It may feel like your body and your mind are separate from each other. If that happens, you must not tell anyone. To do so could have…dangerous consequences.”

This makes no sense to me at all. From what I’ve learned in science classes, simulations are an all-or-nothing situation. Either you’re immersed in it or you’re not. Even if awareness in simulations were possible, how would Marcus know about it? Yet another question he will never answer for me.

I nod at Marcus and keep my face relaxed, but I press my palms together so hard the muscles in my upper chest start to burn. “I understand.”

“Repeat what I told you,” he says, unable to keep urgency out of his voice.

“Take the cheese, not the knife. Save the girl by throwing myself in front of the dog. And if I feel like I’m not entirely in the simulation, don’t tell anyone.”

“Go to your room,” he replies. I see the tension leave his shoulders and I know I’m safe for now. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

Hatred keeps me awake past midnight. I want to hit Marcus for telling me the things he did, even though another part of me knows that he is trying to protect me from something with his warning. The aptitude test was my one chance to truly know where I belong, and he took it from me. He will access my test results himself if I don’t tell him, or if he thinks I lied to him. I wonder for a moment if he would keep me from attending the ceremony altogether if my result weren’t Abnegation, but decide he won’t. The other council members know I’m choosing this year. Marcus wouldn’t want to answer their questions.

The next day, I sit in the school cafeteria next to one of my few friends, Susan Black, as we wait for our names to be called. She looks nervous, and I want to tell her she’ll be fine, but I have too much on my own mind. I wonder if Marcus was telling the truth. I discard this thought almost as soon as I have it. The Abnegation think that lying has its roots in selfish motivations, and Marcus adheres to this. You lie to make yourself feel better at the expense of others, is the belief. It’s better to tell someone a painful truth than it is to decide you know what’s best for another person. But even if Marcus were inclined to lie, he’d have no reason to lie about my aptitude test. And he isn’t a good enough liar to fake that apprehension I saw in him last night. I take deep breaths and think of his instructions, rehearsing my fake choices in my head.

“Daphne Sinclair and Tobias Eaton.”

We follow the Abnegation volunteer who called our names to the testing rooms. I steal a glance at Daphne, but she is staring straight ahead at the door to her room. No curiosity in her, a good child of Abnegation. My door is answered by a Dauntless woman who seems almost bored as she ushers me in.

I can’t help but look at her as she programs the simulation. She has a row of tiny braids over one ear, which bears five sparkly silver earrings. Her shirt is sleeveless, and black and red tattoos cover her arms. The idea of having the daily choice of how to wear my hair, my clothes, jewelry, tattoos, seems overwhelming but also alluring. I want to ask her how she can get anything done in the face of having to make so many decisions every day, but I don’t. Instead, I sit in the chair as she instructs.

She looks at her screen, then at me. “Tobias Eaton?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She snorts. “You and all the other Stiffs calling me ma’am. It makes me feel old.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am.”

Pausing, she then laughs. “Was that a joke?”

I don’t know how she wants me to answer. If I say yes, I’ve amused myself at her expense. If I say no, I’ve maybe insulted her further.

“Well, if it was, it was a pretty good one,” she says, and I allow myself a little smile. “Sit back and drink this.” She hands me a vial of clear liquid, just like Marcus said she would. I know what’s coming, but I still hesitate. “It’s okay,” she tells me. “It doesn’t taste like anything. It won’t hurt.”

Nodding, I drink the serum. Then I exhale, force my back to relax, and close my eyes.

Everything happens just as Marcus said it would. I pick up the block of cheese and the knife disappears. I save the little girl, letting the dog close its sharp teeth around my upper arm. I yell out and wake, finding the origin of pain to be not my arm but my lower lip, which I have bitten.

The Dauntless woman is not just looking at me, but studying me. _She knows_ , I think. Just as Marcus warned me, I was aware that my physical body was in a chair at the same time my simulation body was in the school cafeteria. She knows in the same way Marcus knows. And somehow this has put me in danger.

“What was my result?” I ask her.

“Abnegation.” But she says it like there’s a qualifier to her answer. The want to ask her what’s on her screen is tearing me apart. Could she be wrong? Did I really test Erudite, like I hoped? I can’t figure out what reason she would have to lie to me, though.

“Tobias, can I ask you something?”

I don’t want her to ask me anything. I want her to send me out and forget me just like she’ll forget all the other Abnegation kids she tests today. I grip the armrests of the chair and say, “Um…okay.”

“When you were taking the test, did you know where you were?”

“Sure,” I reply. Despite everything I’ve been taught about lying and how it goes hand in hand with selfishness, this will have to be an exception. Too much is at stake for me to tell her the truth. “I was in the school cafeteria. Then there was a dog, and a little girl it was going to attack.”

“No, I meant…” She’s looking right at me, but she twists one of the silver rings around her fingers. “Did you feel like you were anywhere besides the cafeteria?”

I shake my head. “No, ma’am.” I maintain eye contact when I say it and pretend I’m giving an answer in class that I’m absolutely sure of.

Looking from her screen to me and back, she says, “Well…if you’re sure. But if not, it’s all right. You can tell me and I won’t share it with anyone, I promise.”

I can’t tell her, but it’s taking all my inner strength not to. She’s not Candor, so I don’t believe she’d share my secret just because her faction compels her to. I also don’t believe she’s inherently untrustworthy, and I have been itching to ask someone, anyone, about why I might be dangerous. But I am more afraid of Marcus than I am of lying to this woman. He made it clear that acknowledging my awareness would put me in danger. It’s better that I not give myself anything more to have to lie to him about.

Standing, I say, “I’m sure. Thank you,” and I leave.


	3. Chapter 3

I walk home again today, and my legs seem to grow heavier the closer I get to Marcus’s house. Abnegation, not Erudite. It’s a minor consolation that my result is the one Marcus wanted for me. I will have to do anything I can to hide everything else that happened. It might be as dangerous to tell the truth as it would be to lie to Marcus.

Caleb returns home much earlier than I thought he would. Usually he has community service after school and gets home just in time to cook dinner on the nights it’s his turn.

“Hi, Tobias,” he says when he sees me sitting at the dining room table staring out the window.

“Hi.”

He narrows his eyebrows and tilts his head a little. “Are you okay?”

I can tell he wants an honest answer. I love him for it, but I can’t give him what he wants. “Yes. I’m fine. Just…thinking.”

“About your test results?”

“Yes.”

“What did you get?” he asks, sitting across from me.

I shake my head and smile at him the way I used to when he tried to convince me to give him an extra piece of the candy we got at New Year’s. “You know I can’t tell you.”

“But you’re going to tell Dad, aren’t you?”

His question comes out like an accusation. Even at fourteen, he is fully cognizant of Marcus’s need to control our entire lives. The thought makes my heart feel like it’s sinking into my stomach. As much as I can, I have always tried to protect Caleb from what I see as the broken parts of our family and society. When I see him about to ask a question of Marcus, any question that might reveal a crack in his world, I try to stop him. But I can’t. He can see the cracks too well, maybe even better than I can, and he knows he can be frank with me, that I would never hurt him for any curiosity. He doesn’t let me get away with faking it. This ability to see the truth of matters is both his best and worst trait. It means I cannot lie to him, but it also means that he never holds Marcus’s actions against me. I often believe, and I wonder if Caleb does too, that Marcus tries to push us apart. We will not let that happen.

I will not let that happen.

“I’m going to have to, I guess.” Saying that makes me feel cleansed, because it’s the truth, but it also makes me feel dejected. I can’t see a way out of telling Marcus what he wants to know, not without taking punishment for it. I console myself with the thought that I might have to tell Marcus the truth about what happened in the aptitude test, but he will never know I plan to choose Erudite. He can’t read my mind.

There’s something hesitant in the way Caleb takes his next breath. He holds it, then lets it out, like he was going to say something but changed his mind. “What?” I ask.

“Nothing.” He looks at his watch. “Want to play checkers? We’ve got some time.”

“Yes. That sounds good.” Yet again, Caleb has shown me how he is a perfect fit for Abnegation without even trying. He didn’t suggest playing for amusement. He suggested it because he knows I need something, anything, to keep my mind off my test results for a while. He will not let me drown in my thoughts.

The cover on the box he pulls from the drawer under the coffee table is tattered, and the corners are coming apart, but all the pieces are there. He unfolds the board as I separate the red from the black checkers.

“Best of three,” he says as he arranges the red checkers on his side. “Loser makes dinner _and_ washes the dishes.”

“If you wanted to make dinner that badly, you could have just asked to swap with me,” I tell him, because tonight is supposed to be my turn. I have a hard time believing Marcus won’t notice that the same person is doing both in a household where we’re supposed to share work equally, but I like the way my response makes Caleb grin.

“It’ll taste great on the dishes you’re going to have to wash,” he replies, making the first move.

I let him win two of the three games.

In the evening, I go through the motions of cooking but almost let the tomato sauce boil over because I’m so distracted by what the Dauntless woman asked me. What she knows. Will she report me to someone because I was aware during the sim? Am I some kind of aberration without even knowing it? From the way Marcus acted, it wouldn’t surprise me. Maybe that’s why he’s been so cruel to me all these years, trying to squelch whatever it is that makes me different. I wonder if it’s tied to the things that make me want to press against Abnegation’s rules until they crack like thin glass.

Marcus opens the front door just as I’m straining the noodles. “Dinner is almost ready,” I call to him. He won’t want to eat if the food is cold, so I’ve bought myself at least half an hour to figure out what I’m going to say when he asks me what happened during my aptitude test.

He leaves his shoes on the mat by the front door and comes into the kitchen. “What were your test results?” he asks, without pretense of caring about the rest of my day.

“Abnegation,” I say, mixing sauce into the noodles. I don’t even think about making the excuse that we’re not supposed to talk about our results with anyone. I have no choice where Marcus is concerned.

“Look me in the eye and say that, Tobias,” he commands.

I look up and stand straight, shoulders back, hoping the gesture will hide my fear of him. “I got Abnegation.” Marcus has never thought much of the Dauntless, and I play into this. “My test administrator was Dauntless. They’re not known for their powers of observation. She couldn’t even tell me apart from all the other Abnegation kids.”

“Did she say anything else about your test?”

Transferring dinner to three plates, I shake my head. “No.”

“You’re lying.”

I concentrate on not dropping the hot plates as I carry them into the dining room. Marcus steps back but does not take his eyes off me. “I don’t have anything to lie about,” I say as I put the plates on the table. “My test result was Abnegation. You can look it up yourself.”

Marcus crosses his arms over his chest. He is not satisfied with my answer. I head back into the kitchen and when I return with the salad, he has taken his seat.

“Caleb,” I call, “dinner’s ready.”

“Your brother and I have to talk in private,” Marcus says to Caleb after he finishes washing the dishes. I am still sitting at the table, wanting to escape but knowing I can’t. “Go to your room.”

“Yes, sir,” Caleb says without hesitation. He dries the last of the silverware and walks up the stairs to his room. If I were in his place I’d do everything I could to listen in, but I know he won’t. Not because he fears what Marcus might do if he’s caught, but because that is the rule Marcus has laid down.

I shrink back when Marcus sits beside me at the table, not across from me. I’m in striking distance.

“Now, let’s start this conversation again. What was your test result?”

“Abnegation,” I answer immediately.

“You know that I have access to the test results.”

“Yes, sir. My result was Abnegation.”

Indecision curls Marcus’s lip. I think he wants me to be lying to him about this just to have an excuse to hit me. “All right. Abnegation. Tell me what happened during the test.”

“Everything happened just like you said it would.” I recount the choice, the dog, the girl. “Then the Dauntless woman told me my result, and I left. I think she was bored.”

“And during the test, did you have any awareness of where you were?”

I knew the minute I emerged from the sim that I was never going to tell Marcus about my awareness. If I was in danger for it then, I figured I could only be in more danger from Marcus by revealing the truth to him. During dinner I came up with the answer for this question. I pause and run it through my head one last time before speaking. “At the end, I felt pain in my shoulder from the dog biting it, but then I woke up and I had bitten my lip. Is that what you meant when you said I might be aware of my body?”

The silence after I answer tells me Marcus isn’t satisfied. He stands and shouts, “Caleb! Come downstairs immediately!”

Caleb knows better than to hesitate. Or maybe it’s that he’s so worn down by Marcus that passivity has become second nature. Either way, I hear the door to his room open and his footsteps on the stairs. He looks curious, but not wary. I almost tell him to run. I am the one who has sinned here, not Caleb. I can’t figure out what Marcus wants with him, but I know it can’t be anything good.

“Your brother is a liar, Caleb,” says Marcus. His tone is mild but his eyes are full of fire. “He is not being honest about his aptitude test. Do you think that’s acceptable?”

Caleb looks from Marcus to me. He knows Marcus has backed him into a corner. “I…no, sir,” he says. His voice is thin. There is no right answer here. There is only the one that will lead to the smallest amount of punishment.

“I didn’t raise my son to lie to me, did I?” He is looking at Caleb, but I know his words are meant for me.

“Dad, please, I—” I start, standing so I can get his attention.

“Stop talking!” Marcus roars, and I cringe, backing away a step. “I can’t stand to look at you. You are deceitful, and you need to face the consequences of your actions.

“See what your lies have wrought, Tobias. Understand that it is not just you who suffers when you lie.”

Marcus swings his fist and hits Caleb in the face before I can comprehend his words. Caleb stumbles back in surprise. He raises his arms to cover his head, but some damage has already been done. Blood trickles out of his nose and over his lip. Marcus knees him in the stomach and he falls into the couch. This fight is nowhere near fair. In my mind, I am throwing myself in front of Caleb to save him from Marcus. My body, though, cannot move. All my joints have locked. My bones are leaden. I think I’ve stopped breathing and there are black spots at the edges of my vision.

I open my mouth to tell Marcus to stop, that I am the one who deserves his violence, not Caleb. No sound comes out. My throat has closed. He lands blow after blow in Caleb’s ribs, his kidneys. I think I hear Caleb screaming my name, but it sounds like he’s at the opposite end of a long tunnel. I would know what to do if Marcus hit me. But this is the first time he has ever struck Caleb for my transgressions, and I am so shocked by his actions that I have neither fight nor flight in me.

“Did you think I wouldn’t know what really happened during your test?” Marcus spits at me when he has hit Caleb for the final time. Caleb is panting, bent double, one arm across his stomach and the other pinching his nose. Then Marcus grips my upper arms. He says into my ear, quiet and malicious, “I know what you experienced under the influence of the serum. You saved a little girl who you knew wasn’t even real, but you did nothing right now to help your brother. Think of this moment when you choose tomorrow.”

While Caleb is still incapacitated, Marcus pulls me upstairs by my arm, fingers digging into my bicep. I fight against him, trying to get away so I can help Caleb, but rage has given him superhuman strength. He opens the door to the hall closet and throws me inside. I stumble, and by the time I’m upright he’s already locked me in. When I grew three inches last year, Marcus put a deadbolt on the outside of the door. No matter how much I pound at the thick wood and twist and kick the knob, the door doesn’t budge. Thoughts of Caleb bruised and bleeding make me struggle against the door long after I’m sweating and aching from the effort. I need to get to him. I need to make up for everything I just failed to do. But after some time, I have to give up. The door is doing more damage to me than I’m doing to it.

Suffocated by the close walls and the reek of cedarwood, I curl up in the corner, arms around my shins and my head on my knees, and pray. For myself, for Caleb, that something somewhere will fall out of the sky and expose Marcus for what he truly is. I don’t think God is really listening, but if Caleb has faith maybe it will work for me on his behalf. “I’m so sorry,” I whisper over and over, though I know I should be saying it to Caleb and not to God. “I know I should have stopped him. I was… I just… I froze. I’m so sorry. Please let Caleb be all right. I promise I will never let Marcus hurt him again.” But even as I pray I hear Marcus whispering in my ear. I saved the girl in the sim, but I couldn’t save Caleb. I am weak and selfish and a coward and a liar.

Caleb would never have failed me the way I just failed him. When Marcus hit Caleb, I was supposed to defend him. The one person, the only person, I love needed me more than ever before, and I choked. How many times have I thought to myself in the past that Marcus could do whatever he wanted to me as long as he didn’t hurt Caleb? Then came the opportunity to let him do just that and I showed both of them that I could not rise above myself. What is selfishness if not being able to push past your own fears when someone else needs you?

Eventually I fall into a restless sleep, and I wake with a single word in my head: _Erudite_. If I can’t be there for him in the moment Caleb needs me most, I have no place in Abnegation. I don’t deserve him and his unfailing selflessness. Erudite will be a fresh start. I can take a new name, build a career, and still serve others through teaching. I can ask for an assignment to the Upper Levels classes and keep an eye on Caleb that way. I’m not sure what time it is, but I check the door. The knob turns and the door opens. Caleb must have, like he always does, opened the deadbolt. I peek out carefully, just in case Marcus is waiting to punish me further. It’s still dark, so I head for my room. The clock on my bedside table tells me it’s two-thirty in the morning. I double-check my alarm and pull the blanket up to my chin.

When morning comes, I shower and dress for what I tell myself will be the last time in my gray robes. In the hallway, I think about moving the panel over the mirror and checking my reflection just as an act of defiance. But I don’t.


	4. Chapter 4

Caleb is already seated at the table when I enter the dining room. There’s nothing but a piece of dry toast on his plate. I can barely look at him; I feel so guilty about what happened last night. In every faction, every family, big brothers are supposed to watch and care for the little ones. All my life I’ve kept Caleb from crossing the street without looking, shared the chocolate Katherine sometimes brings me from Erudite, made him laugh, and let him beat me at checkers and Parcheesi. Now, it feels like I’ve lost anything good I built through those smaller acts. If there were ever a time Caleb needed me, it was last night. The last memories he has of me at home will be of my standing there watching as Marcus beat him.

I’m too upset about last night to eat, but I sit in my usual spot across from Caleb. I can’t bring myself to say anything for a few minutes. Finally, shame pushes the words “I’m so sorry” out of my mouth.

He shakes his head and doesn’t look me in the eye. “Don’t apologize. There’s nothing you can do about it now.”

I press my lips together and look down at the table. If those are the last words Caleb ever says to me, I deserve them.

Marcus comes downstairs at seven-thirty and, like me, doesn’t eat breakfast. He doesn’t need to ask us if we’re ready to leave and he doesn’t pretend to care.

All three of us are completely silent as we catch the bus. Caleb exits at the stop for school while Marcus and I ride on toward the Hub. I stare at the backs of the other passengers, letting their chatter fill my ears.

I have to leave for Erudite. I have to. If I am even half as selfish as Marcus always says I am, it’s the right choice. Then my thoughts come back to Caleb. I know I could be right to assume that Marcus will continue to treat Caleb better than he treats me. That he is more violent toward me because he can see how I struggle with Abnegation’s rigidity and how I think about myself in times I shouldn’t. If I’m wrong, however, it might mean Caleb’s death instead of mine at Marcus’s hands. I could never live with myself if that happened. Marcus thought nothing of beating Caleb to punish me, but would he still feel that anger if I were gone? I think of one of the multiple-choice answers I see on math tests, the ones I’m sure my teachers put there to trip us up: _There is insufficient data to formulate an answer._

Maybe the fact that I thought of that sentence is proof enough I should choose Erudite.

I hardly feel the tightness in my legs as I climb the stairs in the Hub with the other Abnegation. Once we’re in the auditorium where the Choosing Ceremony is always held, Marcus turns to me. It’s too much to hope that he’ll say something encouraging, that he’ll offer me the nervous smile or the pats on the arm I see the other parents giving their children, but I do for a second anyway.

“Caleb and I will see you at home,” he says without a smidgen of doubt, and then he leaves to talk to some of the other council members. His mention of Caleb sends me back to the point of indecision. I watch his back, thinking this is the cruelest he has ever been.

If I am as much like him as I think, I know how to return that cruelty.

Too soon, a Dauntless man steps forward to applause and hollers and begins the ceremony. His words aren’t much more than a rush in my ears. Something about making our own decisions, starting lives as adults. Maybe that’s true for everyone else. My life, however, has never completely been my own. Decisions have never been mine to make. Not until now. In minutes, Marcus will have no choice but to stand where he is with the other Abnegation and watch me choose Erudite.

Blue and red and black and gray clothing blurs as my classmates choose their factions. I try to count the transfers but lose track somewhere around the Ns. I think someone from Abnegation transfers to Candor, but it might have been Amity. A few take more than the usual three seconds to give their blood and I wonder if they are like me, if their aptitude test didn’t give the simple answer they thought it would. Or if they have someone in their lives who holds them back from truly being free to make their decision.

“Eaton, Tobias.”

Having skipped breakfast, I feel weightless as I walk toward the bowls. The Dauntless man hands me my knife when my turn comes. It’s bright silver under the lights, not unlike the one I was offered in my test. I wish it were Abnegation’s turn to lead the Choosing Ceremony this year, because it would put me close enough to Marcus with this knife for me to drive it into his heart. I look at the Erudite bowl, envisioning my blood spiraling through the water as it dissipated. That would put a metaphorical if not a physical knife into Marcus.

But I cannot make that choice.

I love Caleb more than I hate Marcus, and I cannot choose anger and retaliation over love.

Caleb was wrong when he told me at breakfast that there was nothing I could do now. There is one thing. I must go home to him today, tend to his wounds, keep him safe. I will never allow myself to be paralyzed with fear again like I was last night.

I slice the palm of my left hand and hold it over the Abnegation stones. From this point on, I will look ever outward. I will forget myself. I will dedicate myself to a simple life, a life of service, and I will protect Caleb. I will be home every night. Whenever the moment calls for it, I will put myself between him and Marcus. If every day of the rest of my life is selfish, let me have the knowledge that in this moment, I did the only unselfish thing I could think of to save my brother. If Marcus ends my life, so be it, as long as Caleb can have the rest of his in peace.

Blood before faction.

Blood before everything.


	5. Chapter 5

Marcus doesn’t say anything to me on the bus ride home. I use the time to plan. My eight weeks of community service for initiation start tomorrow. Some initiates, usually the ones who are Abnegation born, take on extra volunteer work a few evenings a week, but I won’t. Not unless I can make my schedule match Caleb’s exactly. For the rest of the summer, I’ll work in my garden after dinner. We usually leave the windows open, so I’ll be able to hear any fights. I’ll find something to do inside in the winter, even if it’s just reading or preparing meals or cleaning. I’ll always be somewhere near Caleb.

At home, I bargain with Marcus to be put on permanent dinner preparation duty. My reason for doing so is logical but also a perfect excuse: it makes sense for me to cook dinner because I’ll get home before him, and Caleb can use the time he would spend making dinner to add to his volunteer hours or do his homework. That way, I also figure, Marcus and Caleb will not be alone together in the evenings. I’ll wash the dishes, too. I don’t care. I don’t ask Marcus to be a part of any of it. I just about fall over when he agrees to the arrangement. Caleb only nods and says, “Yes, sir,” when Marcus informs him that our chore schedule will change. He never much liked cooking anyway.

Two years, I remind myself as I settle into bed. Just two years of vigilance, and then both Caleb and I will be free. They won’t be an easy two years, but I will do anything it takes to get Caleb to his Choosing Ceremony safely, with as little worry as possible. After Caleb chooses, it doesn’t matter what happens to me. I’ll be content to patch sidewalks or feed the factionless or do whatever else Abnegation asks of me for the rest of my life. I’ll watch him marry and have kids of his own, something I’ve decided is not an option for me. I can’t take the risk that I’ll end up like Marcus. No matter how much I’m aware of my own capacity for violence, I can’t trust that I’ll be able to control it. Better to live alone, be alone.

July fades into August, then September, and Marcus does not change. I thought for a stupid moment that my choice to stay in Abnegation might do just that. I thought he might see that I am doing everything in my power to lead a selfless life. Nothing I do seems to matter, though. He never has any patience for me. He speaks to me only to order or criticize. When he has a bad night, which is more often now that Erudite has declared their intention to seek control of the city government, he will hit me with his belt or a wooden spoon and throw me into the upstairs closet. More than once I fantasize about leaving, about jumping onto a train the way the Dauntless do, riding it out to Amity, and spending my life picking crops in peace and safety. I get as far as envisioning myself in a sunny field of corn when I think of Caleb. If I ran away, I wouldn’t put it past Marcus killing Caleb to spite me. I suppose I could take him with me, but he deserves to finish school.

Despite everything Marcus does to me, I keep my secret promises about Caleb. Every morning, I get up before I have to and make sure Caleb eats breakfast and has his homework done. I don’t volunteer for extra community service projects. Through the fall and winter the other Abnegation in my initiation class host dinner parties at their homes, and they’re happy to invite Caleb when I mention him. He plays board games with his friends and volunteers to wash dishes, not knowing it’s all part of my plan to minimize his time with Marcus and enable him to choose Abnegation because he knows it’s who he is, not because he feels he must.

At the beginning of March, I start preparing my garden. My mother planted it not long after I was born, and she used to spend hours out here every spring, summer, and fall. When she saw that my interest in her plants went beyond just wanting to make a mess in the dirt, she started giving me small tasks to do. By the time I was six it was our project, our special time together. After she died, the garden did too, but two years ago I started planting herbs again. I grow anything that I can make survive in our broiling, humid summers: spearmint, coriander, basil, sage, lemon thyme, dill. I trade with the neighbors for flour or eggs, and they give me boxes of tea leaves they make from my herbs. Now, as I look at the collection of terra-cotta pots and hand tools and bags of potting soil, I see new possibilities. I can plant more than herbs. I can grow extra food for Caleb. It won’t be anything on the scale of Amity. Our back yard is too small for fruit trees and I don’t have any of their technology to work with. But I could probably produce a decent amount of vegetables. Potatoes and carrots. My largest pot could easily sustain a tomato plant. I think peas and lettuce are easy to grow too.

The idea of keeping Caleb strong through my gardening efforts sends me on trips to the Abnegation library. I take notes on planting seasons and request seeds and a few planters from Amity, which they send; I’m not the only person in Abnegation with a backyard garden. Marcus has no interest in the garden, never has, so he doesn’t ask me why I come home with the supplies. As far as he knows, it’s just replacements for whatever didn’t survive the winter. With every seed I plant and stake I tie, I think of Caleb. He is more than worth the ache in my lower back and the blisters on my hands.

More than once, Caleb offers to help me garden. Sometimes I accept. Most of the time, I want the garden to myself. I don’t want Caleb to see what I’m doing for him. I don’t want him to even entertain the idea that I grow food for him because I think he’s needy. I’m not sure he’d get the distinction if I explained I’m growing the food to keep him strong, not because he’s weak. The garden also the spot where I do my thinking, my planning to get both of us out of Marcus’s house. But when I’ve had a long day or just want to spend more time with him, I let him water the plants and pull weeds. I pretend I don’t see him lingering over the fennel, inhaling the sharp anise scent. I know how much value there is in those stolen moments of solitude, of getting to do something purely for your own pleasure, however small.

Later in the summer I pick and prepare what I can as soon as it’s ready. Caleb seems to eat nonstop lately, so I make sure to always have fresh vegetables and hard-boiled eggs and cheese for him in the fridge. I get a recipe for zucchini bread from a woman in my volunteer group and notice that Caleb can eat an entire loaf by himself. As summer passes into fall, I plant squash and brussels sprouts and collard greens for him. So much of Caleb’s life is out of my control: friendships, Marcus, the Erudite kids who bully him at school. Keeping him healthy, however, feels like the thing I was put in this world to do. I know I’ve done something right when in January I ask him to retrieve a glass from a high shelf and he reaches it with minimal effort, something he couldn’t do last summer. He’s going to be taller than I am by the time of his Choosing Ceremony.


	6. Chapter 6

One Saturday night later that winter, Robert Black invites me and Caleb to have dinner at his house with him and Susan. The Black family has lived a block away from us my entire life. I don’t even remember a time when I didn’t know Robert and Susan. Our mothers were friends. Susan jumped rope with me when we were little, had macaroni fights with me in art class, and copied my math homework when we got older. If I had a best friend, she would be it. The one thing I’ve never been able to tell her, though, is the truth about Marcus.

In the weeks leading up to our Choosing Ceremony, I’d mostly avoided her. I thought she’d be able to read my indecision just by looking at me. But if she noticed, she didn’t say anything. I’ll never know if she kept quiet because she didn’t notice I was torn between factions, or if she kept quiet because she did. Regardless, when we both chose Abnegation, she was at my side from orientation through initiation. We did our community service projects together and even sat together at the initiation ceremony. Sometimes I think the real reason I don’t want her to know about Marcus is that she personifies everything that is good and beautiful about Abnegation. Knowing what it hides could make her question all the ideals she upholds. I don’t want that for her.

Mr. and Mrs. Black are at a gathering for council members, along with Marcus. We have the house to ourselves. Robert and Susan still live in their family home, per Abnegation’s rules. There isn’t enough housing for every new member to get a house of their own, so Abnegation-born members stay in their family homes until they marry. The house is nearly identical to mine in layout and furnishing, but there’s something about it that seems warmer, more welcoming. I feel relaxed here the way I should in my own home. This is a house where the family doesn’t question their love for each other. Where arguments get settled with words instead of fists. Robert likes to cook, and the smell of baking bread always hangs in the air.

After dinner, we all clean up, then the four of us settle in for our ongoing Pictionary tournament. The teams are always the same: me and Susan versus Caleb and Robert. Susan is a terrible artist, and while she usually has a good sense of humor about my guessing that her porcupine is a cactus, she seems a little restless tonight.

When Robert and Caleb are beating us by ten points, she turns to me and says, “I think I’m done. Tobias, do you want to go for a walk?”

“Go,” Robert mouths to me when I glance at him. “Caleb,” he says, “play chess with me. Susie never wants to.”

“Yes, I’ll go with you,” I tell Susan as Robert trades the Pictionary cards for a chess set. We pull on hats and scarves and mittens and step into the clear night.

“Thank you for coming with me,” Susan says as we walk away from her house. “I just get tired of losing. We need to find a new game to play.”

“I don’t mind,” I tell her. “It’s nice to see you and Robert.”

“You haven’t been over in a while,” she says. “Have you been busy with the volunteer team?”

So she’s noticed. “I…ah… Yes.” It’s not entirely a lie, so I feel less guilty about telling it than I should. Still, I hate that she sees I’ve been spending less time with her than usual. It’s not what I’ve wanted. Besides Caleb, Susan is the only person whose presence makes me feel happy and comfortable.

I turn the conversation towards her. “How about you?” I ask. “Are you still interning with the council?”

Nodding, she replies. “I am. It’s interesting. A lot of paperwork, though.” She laughs. “Very glamorous,” she adds with a touch of sarcasm. “But, Tobias, I… I wanted to walk with you to ask you something.” She stops beneath a streetlight. Her breath forms a plume of fog between us.

“Sure,” I reply. “What is it?”

“I…would you… Erudite is sending books over to the Abnegation library next weekend, and I wanted to volunteer to sort and shelve them.” She takes a deep breath. “If you’re available, would you like to come with me? Not with Caleb and Robert. Just us.”

This should be a thrilling moment. Instead, disappointment freezes me in place. Not because of Susan, but because I know I can’t say yes to her. I want to more than anything. I want to do normal things with this pretty girl I’ve known and cared about all my life. I allow myself a minute of fantasies: shelving books together, kissing, a wedding, a home of our own. But then I think of Caleb. I know he would like to see me and Susan together. That part’s not the issue. Time spent doing community service with Susan is time I can’t spend at home protecting Caleb from Marcus. It would only be an afternoon, but Marcus could kill Caleb in minutes.

“I can’t. I wish I could,” I reply, and having to say it stirs anger in my gut. This is another piece of my future Marcus has taken from me. Other people in my initiate class have started dating, doing community service together and sharing meals at each others’ houses. I want that. I want it with Susan. Maybe we could be more than friends, maybe not, but what I want doesn’t matter.

Susan looks away. “It’s all right.”

“No,” I tell her. “It’s not you at all. I… I like you. A lot. When I’m with you I… I always want to feel the way I do when we’re together. And I want to spend more time with you, but I can’t right now.”

She seems confused. “Why not? Wouldn’t you be volunteering anyway?”

I try to work the words in my head into something that she’ll understand, and that won’t hurt her. “Not right now. I’m… Right now, I’m…ah… Caleb is relying on me a lot.” Instantly, I regret saying it. Now she’s going to think I’m blaming Caleb for not wanting to do a service project with her. “No. I mean, he’s been so busy with finishing his volunteer hours and school that I’ve had a lot more to do around the house.”

“Oh.” Susan is clearly disappointed, and that makes me feel worse. She’s going to think that I’m not interested in her. Any chance I have at exploring our relationship beyond friendship is about to disappear.

“It’s not you,” I reassure her. “The timing is just really bad. Until Caleb chooses, I only have time for my regular volunteer duties.”

“Duties that are going to go away in a few months.” She sounds dubious and folds her arms over her chest.

“Yes. I…I can’t really explain better than that.”

“Come on, Tobias.” She knows I’m hiding something from her. “We’ve been friends forever. If there’s something wrong, you know you can tell me.”

“Everything’s fine.”

“Do you not trust me?”

That question feels like she sent the cold, damp wind straight into my chest. Despite the secrets I keep from her, I know I could trust Susan with anything. “Of course I do. But you’ll have to trust me, too. I do want to volunteer with you and see if maybe it could be more. You’re one of the best people I know. I always have a good time when Caleb and I come over. I just can’t make it more than that right now.”

Susan looks as dismayed as I feel. “Maybe we should go back.”

“I’m really sorry,” I tell her.

“It’s all right,” she says, though I can tell she doesn’t fully mean it.

We walk back toward her house and don’t say a word to each other. Just before we go in, she stops short of opening the front door.

“You’re one of the best people I know, too,” she says. “And I can’t be upset that you have to take care of your family first. Caleb’s Choosing Ceremony will happen before we know it. I’ll be here when it’s done.”

I melt inside when she says that. “You don’t have to wait for me.”

“I want to. ” She smiles. “I think you’ll be worth it.”

If I were Dauntless or maybe Candor, I would grab her and kiss her right now. And when I was done, I’d tell her everything. Even if she couldn’t offer me advice, she’d listen and believe me. She’d help me make a plan to save both Caleb and myself. But her father is on the city council, and she’s looking at a career there too. Right now, the best I can do is keep her from becoming collateral damage. I take her hand, which I know is aggressive for someone I’m not officially dating, but I hold it loosely so she can pull back any time she wants. She doesn’t let go.

“What are you two doing out there?” calls Robert in a teasing voice.

Our moment broken, Susan rolls her eyes. “I am going to stuff a dishrag in his mouth when we get inside.”

I grin. “I’ll help.”

Susan laughs and squeezes my hand before dropping it. “Come on. Let’s go in.”

I feel warmer, lighter, as Caleb and I walk home later in the evening. Susan’s promise gives me hope. I’d always pictured myself living alone for the rest of my life, but if Susan sees something worthy in me, maybe I’m not as much like Marcus as I thought. I guess I’ll find out in a few months.

* * *

Though Caleb is stronger and taller now, with only a few months left before he chooses, I still put myself between him and Marcus. Caleb, like me, has adopted the habit of only telling Marcus what he absolutely must know as far as school or our friends are concerned. One night in the spring, I hear Marcus pull Caleb aside as I’m washing the dishes. Although I don’t hear Marcus’s words, I know the tone of his voice. He’s upset.

I shut off the water and hear the anger in Marcus’s voice intensify. “I don’t care how the other students in your class did. When you bring home grades like this, it’s further proof to Erudite that they should be the governing faction. When you prove to them that you can’t match them intellectually, that strengthens their argument!”

Caleb is holding a paper that he tosses to the side. “It’s just one test! I’m not going to hurt our entire faction because of it.”

“If it’s ‘just one test’ to you and every other selfish child in Abnegation, it _is_ going to hurt the entire faction.”

I can’t see Caleb’s face because I’m standing behind him in the kitchen doorway, but I know that whatever he does pushes Marcus over the edge. Marcus is quick in grabbing Caleb by his collar, but I am just as fast and reach him in three long steps. I take Marcus’s fist and pry it off Caleb’s shirt, forcing him to turn and face me.

“Leave him alone,” I say. It’s not the most commanding I’ve ever been, but I get my point across. “Caleb always gets—”

Marcus strikes me across the mouth and I stumble to the side. As I’m running my tongue over my teeth to check for blood, he hits me in the stomach, just under my ribs. I fall back and gasp for air.

“Stay out of this, Tobias, unless you want to take Caleb’s punishment for him.”

Until Marcus said that, I never knew how much anger I carried, or what I could do with it. But it’s not just anger, it’s my need to protect Caleb, my promise to myself. To both of us. My field of vision narrows and I feel a tempest at the back of my brain. Lightning sparks in my hands.

Standing as straight as I can, breathing hard, I look Marcus in the eye and say, “Go ahead.” _Kill me_ , I think _._ Because I’m willing to die right now if it means Caleb can get away.

Marcus blinks. I think he’s trying to figure out if I’m serious.

He should know better than to doubt me.

Any hesitation Marcus had disappears in the next second. He aims his fist at my face, and for the first time, I don’t raise my hands to protect myself. Instead, I evade him. I have never done that before, never tried to avoid his hits completely. I’ve always just guarded my face and prayed he wouldn’t do too much damage. But now I have defied Marcus by stepping out of his reach and not letting him hit me, and that can only mean more pain. I make the mistake of looking into Marcus’s eyes and see nothing but hatred and fury.

“Coward,” Marcus says, like the word is a weapon. He reaches for his belt buckle, working it backwards as he speaks. “If you think you’re so brave you’ll take Caleb’s punishment, then you take it like a man. You don’t run away from me like a little boy.”

I watch him fold his belt in half. “Caleb, get out of here,” I say, my eyes on Marcus’s hands.

“No!” Marcus shouts. Guilt grips my heart as I watch Caleb. “You stay right where you are. You’re as much a coward as your brother.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” he says quietly, but I can’t tell if it’s to reassure me or to obey Marcus.

“Take off your shirt,” Marcus orders me.

“No.” I cross my arms over my chest.

“It wasn’t a request, Tobias.” His voice is controlled. It’s more terrifying than if he were screaming at me. “You’ll take yours off, or I’ll have you take Caleb’s off for him.”

I look from Marcus to Caleb. Both are still as stone.

I consider my options. I could reach out and hit Marcus. He wouldn’t expect it. But even if I did hit him, that wouldn’t make him stop. It would only make him angrier, and he’d direct that anger at Caleb. I could grab Caleb and run, but there’s nowhere for us to go. Marcus may be cruel, but he is not stupid. He knows I have nothing to bargain with here. Nothing to offer him that would save both of us.

If Marcus is going to beat one of us, I can’t let it be Caleb.

Without a word, I pull my shirt over my head and hang it on the back of one of the dining chairs.

“Turn around and put your hands on the table,” says Marcus. Then to Caleb, he says, “If you move, you get two lashes for every one I give Tobias.”

I don’t know if Marcus counts, but I do. Eighteen. One for each year of my life. Somewhere around eight, maybe ten, the pain becomes my everything. I feel like I’m immersed in fire. But I hold my shouts of pain in my throat, stifle them with my teeth, for as long as I can. I am determined to show Caleb my strength.

There is a second when Marcus pauses, and I see Caleb step toward us. “No!” I gasp, remembering Marcus’s threat. “Don’t move. I’ll be—”

My reassurance to Caleb that I’ll be okay is cut off with another blow from Marcus’s belt. It lands on top of an already open wound and I scream. My knees wobble. The marks left by the metal edges of his belt buckle are stinging on every inch of skin from my shoulder blades to the base of my spine. I can already feel some of the cuts tightening, trying to form scabs. Scars over scars. My back feels sticky from blood and raw from the breeze that comes off our ceiling fan.

“Look at your brother,” Marcus says to Caleb when he is done. I want to give in to the pain, to pass out, to throw up, but I steady my breathing and rest on my forearms. I am not going to let Caleb see me give in. “It doesn’t matter how many of your punishments he takes. He didn’t do this out of selflessness. He did it because he thinks you’re still six years old. He thinks you’re weak. And you are. You’re weak and you’re selfish, letting him take your place.”

His words travel straight up my spine like I’ve touched something hot. How dare he use this moment to try to divide us, and to tell such lies. I pull myself off the table, though I can’t stand straight. Marcus grabs my arm and pushes me forward. Caleb catches me. He’s strong. Sturdy.

“What kind of man are you,” I say to Marcus between panting breaths, “to hit your own children?”

“Tobias, stop,” pleads Caleb.

“What kind of…justification…do you even have?” I continue.

If my words had any impact on Marcus, he doesn’t show it. “Get out of my sight, both of you,” he orders. “And I don’t want to see either of you until tomorrow morning.”

“Come on,” Caleb says quietly. With his support, I make it upstairs into our bathroom. He starts the shower and turns the water so it’s lukewarm. “Wash your back. I’ll get the bandages.”

The best I can do is stand under the spray. I can barely lift my arms, much less reach around my back. Caleb leaves for a minute. When he returns, he takes the soap from me, gently, like he’s trying not to scare me.

“I’ll…I’ll get this,” he says. He turns me to face the wall of the shower. I’m so worn out that I don’t even care that I’m naked in front of him. The soap stings, but I bear it.

“You know I don’t think you’re weak,” I whisper when he turns off the water. “Never. Never have.”

“Shh. Not now.” He holds out his arm so I can balance as I get out of the shower. I put a towel around my waist. “Sit,” he says. He took the stool from Marcus’s bathroom and placed it in ours. I let him dab peroxide on my wounds and wrap gauze from my back around my chest when the cuts are too close together to place an adhesive bandage. He works patiently, with steady hands.

“Okay,” he says after he’s used most of the gauze from our hoard of first-aid supplies. “Just bandages, no stitches.” Erudite would recruit Caleb for their medical program in a second if they knew he could already make small, neat sutures. “That should get you through. I’ll go to the clinic and get more tomorrow.” He kneels and digs into the back of the cabinet under the sink, where we keep threadbare rags and a few cleaning products. “And take these.” From inside a folded rag, he pulls two white pills. Painkillers. Marcus doesn’t allow them in the house because, he says, they take you out of your mind. The pain he inflicts is supposed to remind us to do better, follow more rules, be silent and subservient and orderly. We don’t deserve a reprieve from it.

Out of my mind is exactly where I need to be right now.

“Thank you.” I swallow the pills with a cup of water Caleb hands me. Then we sit in silence in our bathroom until I start to feel the effect of the medication, a calm that settles like a heavy blanket. I get up from the stool and stumble. Caleb, watching for Marcus, guides me into my room. I lie face down on my bed and sleep for the next twelve hours.

The next day, I realize that Caleb never said anything in response when I told him I didn’t believe he was weak.


	7. Chapter 7

The night before Caleb’s aptitude test, I approach Marcus after dinner.

“Dad, if you want, I can talk with Caleb about his test.”

Marcus lowers his reading glasses and glares at me like I’m an idiot. “Why would I want you to do that?”

I’m confused. If Marcus doesn’t want to talk with Caleb himself, why won’t he let me volunteer for the job? “Well…I only took the test two years ago. I remember it pretty well. I can talk to him about what he’ll face. Maybe he’ll worry less about the test if he hears it from me.”

“He will hear nothing from you. Or me.” To emphasize that he is done with me, he goes back to reading the papers in his hands.

The thought of what he did to Caleb the night of my own aptitude test keeps me standing in front of Marcus. It is one of my few memories of pain that has not dulled with time. “I…” I lower my voice in case Caleb’s door is open. “I remember you telling me not to mention if I felt like I was in two places at once during the sim. That it could be dangerous. Wouldn’t it be dangerous for Caleb, too? I could help him be less scared so he can get his true result.” Sometimes I can prevail when Marcus and I disagree if I use logic. Caleb already has enough to fear where Marcus is concerned. He shouldn’t have to fear his aptitude test on top of that.

Silence. Not knowing how Marcus will react to what I’ve just said is almost worse than knowing he’s about to hit me. But I am stronger now than I was before my own test. If Marcus thinks he will beat Caleb into hiding his awareness during simulations, he is wrong. Caleb will go into his test with no fear, without a scratch, and I will do anything to ensure that.

I never realized how long a minute is until I wait for Marcus’s answer. It is so quiet I can hear the tick of the clock on the mantel. He looks at me and squints, and I feel like he is seeing all my imperfections. Maybe he’s trying to decide whether to hit me for being so inquisitive. I’ll take it, if it means he’ll be too tired to go after Caleb. He shakes his head and says with total surety, “Don’t speak about things you don’t know for certain. I know things about the simulation that you do not. You’ll keep your mouth shut. The simulation will feel completely real to Caleb. He will make the right choice on his own, choose the right faction.” He pulls me to him by my shirt and whispers in my ear, “He is not cursed the way you are.”

So he knows. All my thoughts for Caleb leave when Marcus releases me. I can’t believe it took me this long to realize it. Marcus didn’t warn me about the bilocation feeling because he thought it might happen. He warned me because he _knew_ it would. He beat Caleb the day before I chose because he knew that if I denied my awareness during the simulation, I must be lying.

“But…how?” I ask him. All the questions I’ve held back for two years come rushing out. “What is it that makes you so sure? How do you know? Is it the simulation itself? The serum? What?”

“Are you actually concerned for Caleb, or do you want me to tell you about yourself?” He shakes his head. He sounds like a teacher I used to have who always sighed and berated the class when we didn’t respond as expected. “You haven’t earned the right to know. And judging by the way you can’t let this go, you’ll never earn it.”

I am risking grievous injury, but I can’t stop myself from asking, “Do you have it, too? The…curse?” I don’t know what else to call it. If it were a gift Marcus probably wouldn’t be so worried that I had it. He would be more forthcoming with me, too.

Marcus hesitates, then looks away from me. I want to believe that he is gathering his thoughts, that he wants to tell me all about the curse and how it works and what other traits it brings besides awareness during simulations. He will explain how it engenders all my frustration at Abnegation’s restrictiveness and tell me how to live with it, even overcome it. The hope disappears after about two seconds. I know he would be the last person to ever tell me any truth about himself. Or me.

“Caleb does not, and that is all that matters,” he says, and goes back to his papers. It’s clear that no matter what I want, he has no intention of continuing the conversation.

I want more than anything to ask him what is it that he sees in me, or in Caleb, that makes him so sure I was aware during my simulation where Caleb won’t be. Perhaps the answer is right in front of me: Marcus does have the curse, and he has learned how to hide it from me, from Abnegation. I am much more like him than Caleb is. We both know he can see the short temper and inquisitiveness I work so hard to keep in check. It’s the reason he’s always hated me more, beat me more, shut me in the closet more. He can see that I am rebellious and doubtful too often where Caleb is not. Without my having to tell him, he knows that I only say a small percentage of the words in my head. He must, as I do sometimes, see my mother when he looks at Caleb. He sees what he lost of her when he looks at him: her instincts for altruism, her ability to see beauty in everyday things. When he looks at me, however, he sees all the parts of himself he works to hold back.

But Marcus beat my mother, too. She was never any safer from him than I am.

I drop the subject and dismiss myself.

The next night I’m lying in bed, wide awake in the thick darkness, when I hear a light knocking on my door.

“Tobias? Are you up?”

It’s Caleb. “Come in.”

Caleb closes the door quietly, as not to wake Marcus. I can’t remember the last time he came to visit me in the middle of the night. It’s like no time has passed, though, as I make room for him, turning onto my side and pressing my back against the wall. Caleb and I are too big now to fit comfortably on the bed together, but we’ll tolerate a little discomfort for the sake of closeness.

“Are you thinking about your aptitude test?” I ask once he has settled, lying on his side facing me.

“Yes.”

“Want to tell me what you got?”

“Not really,” he says, but I don’t sense that he’s hiding something from me. It’s more like he’s disappointed.

“Okay.” It’s nearly killing me not to know. I know he told Marcus while I was working in the garden earlier, because Marcus would not have given him a choice otherwise. Regardless of what his result was, he must have either told the truth or lied well enough to make Marcus believe him, because he is unscathed. Marcus hasn’t even raised his voice this evening.

“Can I ask you a question?” he says after a minute.

“Of course. You can always ask me anything.” I might have to lie to him, but I would never refuse a question from him.

“Why did you choose to stay in Abnegation?”

I am sick with the idea that I cannot tell him the truth. It’s the one thing I’ve wanted more than anything, but I cannot chance the shame he may feel if tell him that I stayed to protect him from Marcus. He didn’t, would never, ask me to do that, and I haven’t done as good job of it as I thought I could. At least he’s not sleeping on his back tonight because his stomach and ribs are bruised, the way he had to do before my own Choosing. Maybe that knowledge alone has made my choice worth it.

“I believe in our place,” I begin. It’s only part of the truth, but it’ll have to do. “I believe the most important thing we can do is be unselfish and give what we have to those who need it more than we do. As long as I can see that there are people who lack the things I can give them, I’ll know I made the right choice. They don’t even have to be big things. Sometimes people just need someone to listen to them, and the best thing you can do is give them your time. If I can help others, why wouldn’t I?”

“Not a lot of people leave,” he says. “Does everyone who stays think that, too?”

 _Do you?_ I want to ask. But that would be intrusive. Selfish. Instead, I reply, “I think they do. They take joy in helping others and are satisfied with their only reward being that joy. I think that’s what’s most important to them.”

The answer seems to satisfy him until he says, “Even Dad?”

“I think… I don’t know.” Because even though Marcus is a different person at home than he is at work, he does things every day that benefit people in other factions. I say, “I know that Dad believes in his work on the city council. As for everything else…” But I don’t need to say it. Caleb is smart enough, observant enough, to put the pieces together.

“His definition of selfless is warped.”

There’s a little Candor in the way he is so blunt, but I can’t deny his statement. He said it so quickly, I know he’s had those words in his head for a while. I wonder how long. I sigh. “That’s one way to put it.”

I settle into the darkness and silence, minutes from sleep, when he asks, “Will you come with me tomorrow? To the Choosing Ceremony?”

“I wouldn’t miss it for anything. It’s one of the most important days of your life.”

“It’s not selfish for me to think about what faction I’ll choose, is it?” He doesn’t sound concerned, just curious. Maybe he carries a tiny bit of what seems to be the family curse in that way.

I shake my head. “I don’t think so. I think it’s normal. Even for people who get an Abnegation result and want to stay here, I think everyone has at least a minute where they wonder what it might be like to be part of a different faction. I knew it was right for me to stay, but I’d be lying if I said I never thought about choosing to go somewhere else.”

He appears to consider this, chewing at his lower lip the way he does when he’s working a difficult math problem. “And you chose Abnegation because you think you really belong here.”

I’m not sure whether it’s a question or a statement. He’s so observant. He noticed that I said it was right that I stayed, not that I made the choice because Abnegation was the right faction for me. Then I come up with an answer I can justify to myself: I belong in Abnegation because my true place is here, next to Caleb, doing whatever I can to protect him. “Yes,” I say, studying the shadows over his face. The very fact that he is here with me and Marcus has barely touched him in weeks is reassurance enough. “Absolutely.”

Caleb nods and closes his eyes. In minutes, he’s snoring. I think about prodding him in the shoulder but decide I don’t want to disturb him. Instead, I get as comfortable as I can, folding my arm under my head since he’s now taking up most of the pillow. Warmed by his body heat, I am able to relax into sleep knowing that he is secure here with me.

I wake alone to the buzz of my alarm clock. Caleb must have gone back to his room in the middle of the night. For once, I don’t wake with feelings of dread or anxiety. The few hours of sleep I had were some of my best in months. I’ve done it. Caleb is safe. Marcus won’t do anything to him the morning of the Choosing Ceremony. I pull up my shade, letting my eyes get used to the sunlight. My window faces the back yard, and I admire the neat rows of herbs and vegetables. It was a small thing I did, but I did it perfectly. Maybe that’s too much pride. I let myself feel it for a minute, then it’s time to shower and dress.

It’s Abnegation’s turn to lead the ceremony this year, so Marcus will be giving the welcome speech. Because of this, Caleb and Marcus and I leave so early that we all get seats on the bus and don’t have to give them up. Caleb looks lost in thought, watching the city blocks go by. Marcus and I do not press him.

The auditorium in the Hub is exactly as I remember it from my own Choosing Ceremony two years ago, exactly the way it was last year, exactly the way it will be next year. The stage is set with the faction bowls: Dauntless and Abnegation on the left, Erudite in the center, Amity and Candor on the right. Max, the Dauntless man who gave the speech at my ceremony, is there, arranging the coals to provide enough air flow for them to burn for the entire time. I can’t help but feel a little envious of him as I watch. He looks powerful and strong, wearing his muscular chest and scabbed knuckles like they’re badges of honor. Dauntless was never an option for me, but I wouldn’t mind having some of that bravery against Marcus. I make myself look away and put stones in the Abnegation bowl. When I finish, I see Marcus talking to Caleb at one side of the stage.

The last moments before the ceremony begins are one of the few times the Abnegation allow themselves to be selfish, saying what they know could be their final words to their sons and daughters, their brothers and sisters. I step away as Marcus says whatever it is he has to say to Caleb. I don’t care. He’s probably saying the same thing he said to me, that he will see Caleb at home. No reassurance of love, no smiles, no words of encouragement. It would be too much to expect from Marcus, anyway.

A minute later, Marcus is engaged in conversation with Johanna Reyes from Amity, and I reach toward Caleb. We haven’t hugged each other in years, I think, but whatever may come, I need to do it now. He needs to know that someone, somewhere, cares about what happens next in his life. His grip is strong around my shoulders, though it feels like he’s trembling a little. Probably it’s nerves.

“It’s okay,” I say as I pat him on the back. “I’m here for you.” It’s inconsiderate for me to so openly show him affection where everyone can see us, but if he thinks I’m being rude, he doesn’t show it.

“I feel like I’m about to throw up,” he says when we break apart.

“You’ll be fine,” I tell him. “You won’t throw up. No one ever has.”

“What if I trip? What if I accidentally drip blood into the wrong bowl?” He looks toward Marcus, who doesn’t see us. For once I’m glad for the sameness among the Abnegation. We’ll be difficult to pick out in the crowd.

“You won’t. You’re going to be fine. You’ll make the right decision.”

There’s less than a minute now before the ceremony is scheduled to start. The Dauntless are still laughing and standing around but everyone else is starting to take their seats, forming blocks of color in the rows. I put my arms around Caleb one more time and kiss him on the forehead, just like our mother used to when he was worried or scared as a child. “I’ll be here. I promise.”

“I know,” he says, looking right into my eyes. The way he does it unnerves me. He just told me something important with that look, but I don’t know what it is. Before I have time to think about it, I have to take my seat with the other Abnegation.

Caleb’s class is smaller than mine was, with only about seventy who will choose. As usual, Dauntless has the lowest number of transfers in and Abnegation has the lowest number of transfers out. My stomach knots as the line gets shorter and shorter. Caleb shouldn’t have to take his knife from Marcus. It probably wouldn’t be the first time a child had to take a knife from their parent, but those other parents could not have been the monsters Marcus is. But by now Caleb has to know what he’ll do. Even if Marcus weren’t there, his decision would still be the same. I trust that.

Just like I promised him, he does not trip when Marcus smiles and calls, “Eaton, Caleb.” If Caleb feels anything less than secure in his decision, he doesn’t show it. He walks slowly to the bowls, but his steps are sure. Marcus hands him the knife and nods. I’m nervous, but I don’t understand why. Caleb is considerate, giving, and selfless, everything an Abnegation initiate should be. Putting others first is his reflex. He’s regaled us with stories of how much he enjoys his community service projects on the occasions he has the turn to talk. He will be an asset to Abnegation, and he must know that.

Caleb cuts his left palm, makes a fist, and extends it in the direction of the Abnegation bowl. I lean forward in my seat, squinting to focus on his hand. Before he turns his wrist, he lifts his chin and looks directly at Marcus.

There is a hiss when his blood drops onto the Dauntless coals, and with that sound, everything I am dissolves.

The loud cheer of the Dauntless has the attention of the Erudite, Candor, and Amity in the seats. Everyone from Abnegation, however, is watching Marcus. And Marcus is watching me. I know that look. Marcus blames me for what Caleb just did. I don’t know if anyone else caught his flash of rage. He replaced it with solemnity in less than a second, waiting for the Dauntless to quiet so he could call the next name, a child he has as little regard for as he must have for Caleb now. The other Abnegation probably thought he was just surprised.

I am torn between feeling betrayed and triumphant. What Caleb did was…I want to say it was terrible, but the outcome is terrible only for me. It was defiant. Selfish. Courageous. I succeeded in my plan, but not the way I thought I would. Marcus will punish me for Caleb’s rebellion. And I will bear it, knowing that if Caleb is not safe among the Dauntless, he is at least free. I curl my fists, digging my nails into my palms. I am not allowed to feel betrayed. I only made sure that Caleb could make his own choice. He did not owe me his decision. Though I could see he was made for Abnegation, he knows himself better than I do. I told him that the only way he could be selfish would be to choose his faction for the wrong reason. Dauntless must have been right for him.

I wish he’d been able to tell me why.

Nearly everyone from the four other factions has left by the time I’m able to gather the strength to stand at the end of the ceremony. Other members of my faction are helping to clean the bowls, working together to keep from spilling the water or cutting themselves on the glass. My body goes through the motions of gathering the Abnegation stones and placing them in a box to be broken down and recycled, but my mind has only the sound of Caleb’s blood boiling on the coals. I almost reach for those coals myself, wanting to burn my hand in order to feel something other than loss and emptiness. I don’t know where Marcus is. I know the other Abnegation are looking at me, the lonely Eaton child, and I wish they wouldn’t. I know their words: the choice was his to make; it would be selfish for him to stay in Abnegation if he doesn’t have the aptitude for it. They would say these things with no knowledge of what really goes on in my house, and I can’t deal with their ignorance.

I realize now that Caleb is braver than I could ever hope to be, not because he chose Dauntless but because he didn’t choose Abnegation. Against my Abnegation will, I feel envious of him. I hate myself for my cowardice. I was so blind. So naïve. I was so focused on giving him the opportunity to make his own choice that I never considered he would make a choice that left me completely alone.

He had to have given me a sign somewhere, at some time, that he was going to leave. That no matter what I did, it would never be enough to keep him in Abnegation. But I can’t think of that. I only promised myself that I would protect Caleb, that I would let him live in as much peace as he could until his Choosing Ceremony. Now that moment has come and I… I am lost. I am hopeless. I had never given any thought as to what might happen if Caleb didn’t stay. It seemed so obvious that he was born for Abnegation. All my plans for the future involved him at least peripherally. Now, looking into the future is like turning the last page in a book.

Blood. Faction. Right now, I couldn’t care less about either.


	8. Chapter 8

Abnegation has fifteen new initiates this year. Eleven Abnegation born, two transfers from Amity, one from Candor, one from Erudite. We all meet at the community center, where they are presented with gray robes. I study them as Marcus welcomes them to the faction and think _there should be sixteen_. I force myself to think about anything but Marcus’s words. I believe in the ideas he talks about: giving ourselves to the greater good, putting the needs of others above our own so our society may thrive, but I can’t stomach his hypocrisy, the way he is a model of selflessness by day and a monster by night. Instead of watching Marcus, I watch our new initiates. Even though they’re all dressed alike, I can easily tell who the transfers are. The Candor boy never lowers his head, never takes his eyes off Marcus. The girl from Erudite is taking notes. Part of me wants to hate them for trying to take Caleb’s place, but I shake that off. Choosing your faction doesn’t mean someone else doesn’t get a spot.

The faction tradition is for the members to prepare the first meal after the Choosing Ceremony, and the initiates take care of the dishes and cleanup. A few months ago I was asked to mentor the new initiates, and I agreed in a second because I was so sure Caleb would be part of the group. Today, I wish I’d never said yes. I’ve brought a crate of vegetables from the garden, tomatoes and lettuce and zucchini I grew for Caleb. I keep my head down as I chop them into a salad, but I still nearly slice my finger because I can’t concentrate.

Susan approaches me in the kitchen area. “Tobias, are you okay?”

Now is not the time for me to tell her the truth, but I also wish she could hear the thoughts I can’t say aloud. I am not okay. I have never felt so alone. Caleb is gone. In a way, I am all right with that because I know I can’t begrudge him his choice. Selfishly, all I can think is that I have lost a part of myself.

Susan is one of the last good things in my life. I need to protect her for now. “Yes.”

She knows I’m hiding something. I can tell from the look on her face that she wants to challenge me. I feel my throat closing and look down. “I’m…not now, okay?” I lay the knife on the table. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Picking up the knife, Susan takes over chopping vegetables. “You don’t have to. But if you want to, maybe tomorrow or the day after that, you know I’m here to listen.”

“I didn’t think he would leave.” The words are out before I can stop myself. “He…I thought he loved Abnegation. He was so… How did I not see it?”

Susan looks sympathetic, and that only makes me feel worse. “Never mind,” I say. “I just…” There’s a stack of clean plates on the counter near the sink. Good excuse for an escape. “I’ll put these out.”

The other members and I serve lunch, and I end up sitting next to the Candor boy. He smiles at me as I take my seat.

“Hello,” he says. Maybe he knows more about what it means to be Abnegation than I think he does, because he doesn’t offer me his hand to shake the way a Candor would. “I’m Malcolm Sterling.”

I don’t want to talk to him, but I can’t be selfish. I’ve been tasked with training our new initiates, and it’s not fair to hold back because I can’t stop thinking about Caleb. “Tobias Eaton,” I reply, nodding.

“You’re one of the initiate trainers, right?”

“Guides,” I correct him. “Selflessness is who you are, not something you’re trained to be. Isn’t that why you chose this faction?” He hasn’t been in Abnegation long enough to have learned not to talk about himself. Asking him questions will keep him busy.

“Oh. Yes. Of course. You grew up here, right?” That Candor earnestness is on full display. He’s completely focused on me, really wants to know the answer. And I really don’t feel like talking about it.

I deflect. “Why did you choose Abnegation?”

Malcolm hesitates. I’m not sure if it’s because I so obviously avoided his question or because he needs to put his thoughts together. Then he shrugs. “I like helping people. I used to volunteer every Sunday at the religious services we held in Candor and tutor some of the younger kids after school. We even had this family of cats that lived near Candor, and I liked to bring them food. It just…feels good. It feels right. Like when I’m helping others, I’m where I belong.” Then he looks alarmed. “Wait, that’s not selfish of me to say, is it? That I came here because helping others makes me feel good?”

He sounds just like Caleb did last night…was it only last night?… in my bed. My appetite disappears. I push my plate away. “No,” I say. I take a deep breath. “I don’t think feelings are selfish. Not if they bring you to a place that helps you make others’ lives better through your service.”

“Okay.” He looks relieved. I keep him occupied with questions for the rest of lunch. “Are you done?” he asks at the end, noticing that I haven’t touched my food. “I can take your plate.”

“Yes, I’m done. Thank you,” I say.

“Don’t laugh,” he says as he picks up both our plates, “but this is the best salad I think I’ve ever had. I don’t know what it is, but the tomatoes were so…ripe? Fresh? I’m not sure. They just tasted really good.”

Any other day, I would be pleased by his comment. I often give extra food and herbs to our neighbors, and they’re always grateful for it. Right now, however, I can only think of how it should be Caleb eating that salad. My first instinct is to claim ignorance about the origin of the tomatoes. They weren’t for him. He’s not supposed to have eaten them and definitely not supposed to have enjoyed them. They were for Caleb. I am here for Caleb. Malcolm might belong here, might have chosen Abnegation of his own free will, but he will never be, can never be, Caleb. I force a deep breath in through my nose, hold it for a count of four, and exhale. I’m not being fair to Malcolm. He doesn’t know. Breathe in. Maybe he’ll want a garden of his own. Hold for four.

When I breathe out, I say, “I grew them.”

“Really?” He looks impressed. “I’ve never tried growing food. We had a coleus that grew in our kitchen window back in Candor, but that’s the only plant I’ve ever had. It got pretty big for a coleus, though. Took up the whole window and grew these little purple flowers.”

“Maybe next spring you could start your own garden.” Breathe in. “I could bring you some seeds and plant clippings.” He could grow food for himself and his neighbors, bring something good to Abnegation. Breathe out. “Amity will send you seeds and supplies if you ask for them, too.” I lower my head and bite the inside of my cheek as he collects the dirty dishes. I can’t allow what I wanted for Caleb to get in the way of teaching Malcolm and the other initiates. I need to accept that Caleb chose a different faction and make the best of what I have here.

He nods. “That sounds good. I’d like to try.”

I look around the room. No one but me seems to notice that Caleb is gone. They’re completely focused on serving and cleanup, and later today they’ll completely focus on their newest community service project. They’ll turn away from their own feelings. That aspect of Abnegation life has never fit me, but maybe it’s one I should try to embrace. Maybe I can become who I am supposed to be without dedicating myself solely to Caleb and his safety.

Tomorrow, I am going to tell Susan that I want to volunteer with her. Just us, like she wanted. Caleb is Dauntless now. Our lives may never intersect again. If that’s the case, I will need Susan and Robert more than ever. When people lose family members from other factions to death, we are told to take comfort in our faction, our chosen family.

Faction before blood. Yet another thing I will tell myself until I believe it.

* * *

The sound of Marcus closing the front door after we return home that evening is nearly deafening. Already the house is quieter with Caleb gone. Some life has drained from it. I step into the dining room. Sunlight slants over the table, illuminating waves of dust particles. Dust I will have to clean. I cannot live here anymore, not with pieces of Caleb’s life everywhere: the extra chair at the table, the empty bedroom, the board games. The vegetable garden in the back yard.

I feel as empty inside as the house is. There are no thoughts in my head for once. I am numb, like my entire body is frostbitten. I can’t feel my heartbeat.

I caused this emptiness. I failed. In giving Caleb the freedom to choose, I sacrificed the only joy in this house.

Marcus and I stand in the dining room facing each other for what feels like forever. We say nothing. We may never say anything to the other again. I would be all right with this if the silence weren’t a constant reminder that Caleb is not here to fill it.

After dinner, which I barely remember making, I close the windows and draw the curtains. The rest of Abnegation disappears. The darkness weighing on the silence makes me feel like I am alone in the world, not just in the house, with Marcus.

I’m still standing in front of the last closed curtain when Marcus grabs me by the back of my shirt and slams me into the wall beside the front door. He is bigger than me and surprisingly strong, but I have age and speed and the ability to endure pain on my side. I take a fist to my cheek, a knee to my stomach. If he’s going to hit me where others will be able to see the injury, I won’t hold back. I strike and kick and scream. I won’t give him the chance to come at me with his belt or a broken glass or whatever else he can grab. We grapple against the wall, then on the floor. White stars flash in my eyes when I jerk my head back against his nose. He throws me into the dining room table. I knock over two chairs, landing on my back. I take a second too long to get up, and he presses the sole of his shoe against my throat.

“Caleb is dead to us,” he snarls. “He chose Dauntless over _you_. And if you ever so much as think about trying to communicate with him or see him, this will be the best of what happens to you.” He takes his foot off my neck and kicks me hard in the side. It feels like my stomach and head and lungs explode simultaneously. I can’t move, and I pray he doesn’t go for another kick.

“He was the one this faction deserved,” he says as I try to pull away. “At your best, you will never be half as selfless as he was.”

That’s the last thing I hear before I lose consciousness.

I wake sometime in the middle of the night and stumble to bed, not even bothering to brush my teeth. The next morning, I can barely dress myself for the pain and my stiff muscles. Putting on my tight undershirt is excruciating. I press at my side as much as I can bear, trying to determine if Marcus cracked one of my ribs. Dressing takes me so long I barely have time for breakfast.

Marcus is already at the table. It’s set for two, but my plate is empty.

“Why don’t you have a seat, Tobias?” He gestures to my chair like nothing happened last night, like this is just another unremarkable day that will start with an unremarkable breakfast.

“I’m fine, thank you.”

“Sit!” he shouts, pointing to my chair.

He cannot break me.

“If I don’t, will you hit me?” I ask. I never defy Marcus like this, and for a second I believe that’s exactly what he will do. But he just watches as I make my way into the kitchen and spread peanut butter onto a slice of bread, not even bothering to toast it first. I eat it standing in front of the sink. Talking back to Marcus is an invitation to another beating, but at this point, it would hardly make a difference. Let him break every one of my bones. Let him bruise me. Caleb is free. That knowledge is my anchor. Whatever happens to me, I succeeded in my plan.

I am in too much pain to go to Susan’s house that evening. When my service hours have ended for the day, I make my way to the small clinic that serves Abnegation’s less immediate medical needs. I take two rolls of gauze and four of medical tape. It’s probably only enough to last a couple of days, but I can’t get more right now, not without being asked questions. The Erudite doctor on duty accepts my request for pain medication when I complain of a pounding headache. I have to sign for the medication, but I make sure my signature is illegible. The one pill I take when I get home dulls me enough to make dinner and water the garden. I hide the rest inside my pillowcase. I’ll have to ration them until I’m healed enough to resume my regular physical activities.

I take another pill just before I lie down to sleep that night and wish more than anything that I could talk to Caleb about everything I feel. If I didn’t run the risk of being shot for walking through their front doors, I might even go so far as to try to figure out where Dauntless is, just so I could talk to him. I’m friendly with other Abnegation but not really friends with them save for Susan. Giving her this knowledge could put her and the rest of the faction in danger. Even if Caleb didn’t know what to tell me right now, he’d listen. If Dauntless would let him.


	9. Chapter 9

Every season, the Abnegation sort through donated clothes and shoes from the factions and give whatever is still usable to the factionless. Five initiates are assigned to work with me and Natalie Prior, whom I’ve worked with before but don’t know very well. She is efficient and organized while warm and quick with a smile. That last trait makes me think she didn’t grow up in Abnegation, but I don’t ask. Watching her guide and instruct our group makes me wonder what life would have been like for me if she had been my mother. Not that I would wish her a life of being married to Marcus; I only wish I were her son. She knits scarves and mittens for the neighborhood kids when we have some down time, and I’ve thought about asking her for knitting lessons. The idea of taking a ball of yarn and turning it into something useful is appealing, plus it would give me something to do in the winter when I can’t garden. I know it feels good when my neighbors tell me how much they enjoyed the meals they made with my extra vegetables. I figure seeing kids in the hats I could make would feel the same. Moments like those remind me that even with Caleb gone, staying in Abnegation might still be worth something.

At the very least, knitting would keep my hands occupied.

Today, Mrs. Prior is going over the planned schedule for Visiting Day, which is the day after tomorrow. On Abnegation’s Visiting Day, everyone and their families, regardless of faction, performs a team community service task like fixing a building. We’ll be delivering all the usable clothes to the factionless and taking the rest to the fabric recycling center. I should go with them. I’ve been with this initiate class since their first day, and it’s not like Marcus will join me. He’ll be where he always goes: the city council headquarters. To show up at this year’s initiate community service project would be another twist of the knife of Caleb leaving. I know at least a few of my initiates are looking forward to having their families join them. But as Mrs. Prior talks, my thoughts go to Caleb. I wonder if he will be all alone, or if he’ll have the company of friends whose families won’t visit either.

Mrs. Prior and I are waiting for our initiates to bring boxes of clothing inside when she says, “Tobias, you seem distracted today. Would you like to talk about it?”

For a second, I consider her offer. It seems sincere. Mrs. Prior is one of the Abnegation that remind me of all the things I admire…admired…about Caleb. She seems to believe that sometimes the best thing you can give a person is your time and a listening ear. I’m always willing to give that, but right now I can’t take it. I can’t run the risk of what I say to her getting out to anyone else. Once again, all of Abnegation is paying for Marcus’s actions. “That’s very generous of you. But no. Thank you.”

She looks out the window. Our initiates are still unloading boxes from a truck. “Leaving family is hard,” she says, never taking her eyes off the initiates. “All that talk of faction before blood is supposed to make the people who leave feel better. I’m sure sometimes it does. After all, it would be selfish to ask people to stay in a faction where they don’t belong just to please their families. But no one ever talks about what it means to be the ones left behind. When you live with someone and love them for sixteen years, you can’t just stop loving them and forget about them in the instant they choose a new faction.”

I look at her, curious. From the tone of her voice, I’d think we were having a casual conversation, but I know we’re not. Those aren’t words that come without a great deal of thought. She knows what I’m feeling. Maybe she was born Candor. Or maybe I’m not good at hiding how much I miss Caleb, how I am so raw and directionless without him here. How sometimes I doubt this entire faction.

“I like to think that someone remembers how difficult it can be to adjust to a new faction away from your family,” she continues. “There wouldn’t be Visiting Day without it.”

I shake my head. “My family isn’t coming together on Visiting Day.”

“Maybe not in Abnegation,” she replies. She keeps her gaze straight ahead, but I see her smile. Then she turns to me. “We’ll have more than enough people here to handle the service project.”

It takes me a second to catch on. Then I smile back at her. Not just from knowing that I’m going to see Caleb, but from knowing that she cares. That she understands in her own way. “Mrs. Prior, I… thank you.”

“For what?” she says, raising an eyebrow. I nod. It will be our secret. She remembers what Caleb did. Maybe she saw us hugging before the ceremony. Maybe she sees something in my face that betrays not only how lonely I am, but how worried I am for him. “And please call me Natalie. We’re all adults here.”

Visiting Day is the day after tomorrow. Everything will depend on Marcus going to work. If he keeps to his regular schedule I shouldn’t have a problem. I will have to stay out of his way and make sure he has no reason to hit me until then. The best way to keep him from being suspicious is to avoid him. He’s too good at knowing when I’m hiding something. Another beating could render me unable to jump onto the train. But it’s only a day and a half. I can do it. I’ll keep myself occupied with chores, maybe figure out what I want to plant for fall. I’ll get through.

That night, I start to plan. I don’t know exactly where Dauntless is, but I know I’ll have to get there on the train. There’s only one that comes anywhere near Abnegation. It passes through the old station on Western. I’m healed enough by now that I’m pretty sure I could jump onto it like the Dauntless do. I figure the train has to stop at Dauntless. There’s no way they’re going to ask a bunch of Candor and Erudite parents to jump off. The Dauntless always rode in to school on an eastbound train, so I’ll take one westbound. I’ll leave as soon as I’m sure Marcus is gone for the day.

Apprehension and hope keep me awake long after Marcus has gone to bed. I have a chance to see Caleb, make sure he’s all right. I know I’m risking death just by going. Not from the moving train, but from Marcus finding out. He meant it when he said a beating would be the best thing that happened to me if I tried to get in touch with Caleb. But I’m willing to risk it. I risked it for two years. I can get through one more day easily. If Marcus finds out I went to Dauntless and kills me for it, then at least I got to say goodbye.

I know that Marcus leaves at eight every day to ride the bus to the city center where the council meets. Still, I am in a panic on Wednesday morning that this will be the day he stays home sick or oversleeps. I have breakfast ready when he comes downstairs at his usual time and wash the pans while he eats.

“Aren’t you going to eat, Tobias?”

“I already did,” I answer, letting the noise of the running water muffle my voice. Let him think that I am cleaning up after myself, saving him the chore of washing the breakfast dishes. I am too nervous to eat.

“You’ll be delivering clothes to the factionless with the families today, yes?”

He doesn’t ask out of interest in my activities. He only wants to know where I’ll be at all times, one more way to control me. “Yes. The families should arrive around nine.”

“Not the most fulfilling assignment you thought you’d be given when you chose Abnegation, was it?”

I’m not sure what he means. I shut off the water and look at him. “All service done by Abnegation is important. Sometimes we benefit a small number of people, sometimes a large number, but it’s a chance to be giving of ourselves regardless. I don’t really think about fulfillment. It’s just what has to be done.”

He narrows his eyes at me, but I know he cannot chastise me for resistance or curiosity in my voice because I have neither of those things. For all the times I’ve felt oppressed by Abnegation’s rules, I believe in its mission and the small part I do to uphold it. I never lied to Caleb about that. Our society couldn’t function without the work the factionless do, and I don’t believe someone shouldn’t have clothes to wear just because they’re factionless.

After finishing his meal in silence, he places his plate at the side of the sink and leaves. It needs to be clean when he returns home, so I wash it quickly and place it in the drying rack. I can put it away this evening.

The ten minutes I wait to make sure Marcus doesn’t return feel like ten hours. When I’m sure he’s gone for the day, I leave the house and take a route to the bus stop that puts me behind most of the Abnegation houses. At the stop, I notice a few other Abnegation and get in line behind them so they’re less likely to identify me.

Standing at the back of the bus, I ride northbound along Western until it crosses Milwaukee Avenue. I am the only Abnegation who gets off the bus there, and I have a sense of unease. It wasn’t that I expected anyone else from the faction would be headed to the train to Dauntless. I’m sure most of Abnegation never thinks about the trains the Dauntless ride. But my father is a faction leader, and it would only take one rumor of my skipping daily service to raise Marcus’s suspicion.

I push these thoughts away and follow the faded signs to the train tracks. Though I see no one else on the train platform, I walk to the far end where I think I’m less likely to be seen. That way, I’ll also have as much time as I can get to run alongside the train and jump on. I rehearse the jump in my head, but I know there’s no way to predict how fast the train will be going when it approaches. The only thing I know is that I cannot miss it.

When I see the headlights of the train in the distance, I tense my legs and take a few deep breaths. I start running the second the front of the train passes the end of the platform.

I get lucky. The train slows down and I’m able to throw myself through an open door not too far from the front. I grab a steel bar next to the door just in time to keep from falling on my face. For a moment I can hardly believe my success. Then it hits me that I’ve jumped onto a train and I start shaking. The Dauntless must all be crazy to do this on a daily basis.

Once I’m breathing normally again, I lean against the wall and watch the city go by. There are miles of abandoned brick buildings with broken windows, faded spray paint, and signs beaten by weather. I take in every sight I can, wondering if Caleb looked at these same buildings the day he went to Dauntless. Thinking about today makes me smile. Maybe he’ll show me around Dauntless headquarters, have lunch with me, tell me how his initiation is going. I want to hear everything about his life. I miss him, but I think I understand why he made his choice. I can only hope now that it was right for him.


	10. Chapter 10

It takes about half an hour before the train stops in what looks like an unused station. When I disembark and look at the platform, I see that I’m not alone. I am, however, the only person from Abnegation. Some of the passengers must be visiting people other than new initiates, because there are more people here than transfers in Caleb’s class. The Erudite look at me with interest, then mild revulsion. I stare them down. They have no idea who I am or who my father is. I don’t owe them deference, not here.

I follow the small crowd to the station exit, where a young Dauntless woman with spiky brown hair and a chain linking a ring in her ear to one in her nose greets us.

“Come with me,” she says.

No one in the group says anything as we follow her. The front entrance to Dauntless doesn’t look like much, just double doors with their flame symbol painted on them, but when I look up I see a building stretching ten stories into the sky. Every pane of glass looks to be intact, so I know it can’t be abandoned. Is Caleb in there? Is that where’s he’s learning to be a soldier?

The Dauntless woman herds me in last. The doors shut and I’m struck by how cool it is in here, almost cold. It’s a relief from the outside heat. It’s as dark in here as it is cool, too, and I hear a rush of water in the background. As my eyes adjust to the darkness, I take in the size of Dauntless. It seems enormous. It looks like they could fit all of Abnegation in here too. One of the Candor couples who came in with me is staring like they wish their heads could rotate all the way around. Admittedly I am just as fascinated as they are, but I keep my eyes straight ahead, looking only at the crowds of Dauntless. There is only one thing I need to see while I’m here.

When I don’t see Caleb after some of the others have found their family members, I seek out the woman who brought me here. “Excuse me, I’m looking for my brother. He’s an initiate. Caleb Eaton. A little taller than me, with dark hair. Have you seen him?”

She looks through the crowd for barely a second. “No.”

“Is there someone who’d know where he is?”

“You’re really demanding for a Stiff.”

“I…” I almost apologize, do exactly what she expects me to do. But Caleb is worth more to me than the customs of my faction. I straighten my back, look her in the eye, and repeat his name slowly. “Caleb. Eaton. An initiate. I’m here to see him and I don’t plan on leaving until I do.” My heart is pounding, but I stand my ground.

She rolls her eyes and starts to walk away. I follow her past families of Dauntless, children in black talking to parents and siblings in blue and yellow and white. A few have Caleb’s height, but I see no one with the Abnegation-short hair he must still have. The woman disappears into a crowd, leaving me to navigate Dauntless myself. Maybe Caleb will take me on a tour once I find him.

I wander into what must be the dining hall. It smells of coffee and disinfectant. The long tables are nearly empty, but I see a group of four Dauntless playing a card game. A girl gawks at me and points. I feel my face get hot, but I stay where I am. One of her friends is a tall, slender boy with a strong profile.

“Caleb?” I ask, though I don’t think anyone hears me.

The boy turns to me, and it’s him. I can see two silver studs through his left earlobe and there’s a bruise under one eye, but without a doubt it’s Caleb. Relief floods me. He’s all right. Bruised, yes, but he’s a Dauntless initiate. That’s normal. The Dauntless kids at school were always comparing their various bumps and bruises.

“Caleb!” I call, running toward him.

The girl who pointed at me asks, “Who’s Caleb?”

He shakes his head and stands. “I’ll be back in a minute,” he says to his friends. He points me toward a hallway outside the large dining room.

“What do you want?” he snaps when we are out of both sight and hearing range of his friends.

For a second, I’m too stunned by his tone to reply. He was never, ever so short with me at home. _Dauntless, he’s Dauntless now_ , I remind myself. He’s probably just imitating the way they speak, trying to fit in. “It’s Visiting Day. I came to see you.”

“Well, you saw me. I’m fine. You can leave now.”

“What? I… I just got here.” I want him to know that I took a risk to come here and that he is worth it to me. “Marcus will kill me if he ever found out I came here, and I don’t care.” I realize this is the first time I’ve ever called him Marcus and not Dad in front of Caleb.

Caleb doesn’t move his gaze from my face, and it starts to make me uncomfortable. He’s taking to Dauntless quickly if he’s overcome that Abnegation instinct to be submissive.

Crossing his arms over his chest, he says, “Tobias, do you remember what you said to me the night before my Choosing?”

“I… I know we talked about…” What did we talk about? The thing I most remember from that night is how relieved I was that he was in my bed and Marcus was asleep. That he wasn’t in pain or danger.

He doesn’t wait for me to put an answer together. “Why you stayed in Abnegation. I’ve thought a lot about everything you said, about staying because you believe in serving others.”

“Yes.” I breathe out. “I do.”

“But that’s not the only reason you stayed.”

I owe him the truth, the one thing I could never give him until now. “Yes. You’re right. I stayed for you. I couldn’t leave you alone with him.” The healing wounds on my back and torso begin to tingle. I fear some of them may break open right here, seeping dark red blood into my gray shirt.

Caleb frowns. “Remember the night he made me watch when he hit you with his belt?” he asks.

I couldn’t forget it. “Yes.”

“He said that you still see me as being six years old. Always in need of protection. And you know what? He was right. You thought I was weak, and that’s why you stayed.”

I shake my head. “No, that’s not it—”

“It is!” he shouts. I look around to see if anyone is watching us, but the hallway is still empty. “You thought you were being selfless by staying for me. You weren’t. You thought I wouldn’t survive without you, but you were wrong.”

I hear Marcus in Caleb’s voice and feel my throat closing. I have to maintain control. “Marcus is a liar. You _know_ that.” He has to. If he doesn’t, I am the world’s worst judge of character. If he felt that way, why didn’t he say anything to me about it? I would have told him the truth.

“I didn’t need saving then,” Caleb continues, like he didn’t hear me, “and I don’t need saving now. How blind are you to see that I transferred to _Dauntless_ and still think I need your protection? Dauntless protect others. I’m stronger than you are. I’m doing what you couldn’t. You made the wrong decision. You gave up your entire life to be there for me for two years, all because you didn’t think I could handle Marcus myself!” His last words echo off the tile floor, and I cringe.

“I’m… I’m sorry.” His words are hurting every bit as much as Marcus’s hands, but just like I do at home, I push through the pain. “I thought you loved being Abnegation. And yes, I did want you to make that choice, but I wanted more for you to make it on your own, not because of anything Marcus did.”

He sighs like he’s disappointed with my answer. “Are you even listening to yourself? Half your sentences start with ‘I wanted.’ What you really love is the idea of who you thought I was. I am Dauntless. Not Abnegation.”

I feel unbalanced, like he’s struck me with his fist. “I…I didn’t mean—”

He interrupts. Another Dauntless trait. “You had my life planned out, didn’t you? Abnegation initiation, maybe a place on the city council? Married, two kids, perfect boring Stiff life? You never once asked me what I wanted. Did you even care?”

With every word, he is less and less the boy who climbed into my bed the night before his Choosing. He has become someone I don’t know. Worse than that: he’s become someone I never knew. I let anger amplify my words. “Of course I cared. How could you think I didn’t?”

“You say you wanted me to choose Abnegation because it’s who I was, not because I felt like I had to. But you did just that, you fucking hypocrite. I bet you were going to transfer and changed your mind at the last second. You were selfish and you lied to me. You lied to me for _years_.” He steps back. He has our mother’s eyes, gold and brown and green, but the look in them is pure Marcus.

“Caleb, I—”

“Four.”

“What?”

“My name is Four. I earned it. And we’re done here.” He starts to turn away. “Don’t come back, Tobias. You were never able to see past your own ideas of who I am and what I wanted. I made my choice, and I don’t regret it. Faction before blood.”

Marcus has won. It took sixteen years, but he succeeded in dividing us, in turning Caleb against me.

He walks away to rejoin his friends. I am too deep in disbelief to do anything but stand against the wall for a minute. Then I make my way back through Dauntless, looking only at the ground in front of me. I want to hit something and scream every swear word I know while doing it. The name plays over and over in my head: _Four._ I wish I knew the story behind it.

On my way back to the door, I nearly crash into a man about my age. His long dark hair falls into his eyes and his face is a mosaic of piercings. He looks at me the same way the Erudite do, curious and repulsed at the same time. I wonder if he transferred from there.

“What is this, a fucking Stiff invasion?”

I’m past the point of caring about upholding my faction customs in the face of rudeness. “If one Stiff looks like an invasion to you,” I retort, “you must not feel very secure as a Dauntless. An invasion of what, volunteers and council members? Yes,” I add with sarcasm, “absolutely terrifying. Very fearless of you.”

He steps forward and has me spun around in half a second. “I’m sure you have plenty of fears,” he says, twisting my arm behind my back. But he doesn’t know me. He doesn’t know that I have years of practice staying stoic through pain. He could twist my arm all day. It wouldn’t mean anything.

“Not…anymore,” I say, though I have to clench my teeth around the words.

“Eric!” comes a voice from behind us.

“Bullshit,” he hisses into my ear.

Both of us turn to see a woman stomping toward us. She’s the one who took me here from the train station. “What the hell is wrong with you?” she snaps.

“Found this one wandering by himself. We handle city security here. For all we know, he’s out to sabotage us.”

She considers this. I put my head down and act as unthreatening, as Abnegation, as I can. This man, Eric, is shorter than I am, so I hunch my shoulders and curve my spine. “So instead of calling me so I could escort him back, you decide to twist his arm? Something is seriously wrong with you. Fucking psycho.” She nods to me as Eric lets go and says, not unkindly, “Come on. I’ll take you to the train.”

“And stay out of Dauntless. You’re not welcome here,” Eric says as he shoves me in the woman’s direction. I recognize the note in his voice, and I wonder if his father hit him too. I look back at him, but he’s already retreated.

“Are you okay?” the woman asks me as I follow her toward the door. “Sorry about that. Eric… I promise we’re not all like that here.”

“Yes, ma’am, I’ll be fine.”

“My name’s Shauna. Don’t ever call me ma’am again,” she says in a way that is strict but not threatening.

“Shauna. I’m fine. Thank you.”


	11. Chapter 11

Shauna waits with me on the train tracks near Dauntless. The silence between us must make her uncomfortable, because she says, “How was your visit?”

“Fine.” I’m short with the word, making it clear that I don’t want to talk.

She speaks into a radio to tell the train to stop where we’re waiting. “You don’t look like you’re much in the mood to jump on,” she says with a shrug.

I say nothing. If I had to jump onto the train, I could, but I won’t argue if she wants to tell it to stop.

“Listen,” she says while we wait. “I don’t know what happened between you and your brother, but I have a brother and a sister and even though we fight all the time, I still love them.”

“What?” I snap my head to the side to look at her. “I didn’t say anything about my brother.”

“You’re the only visitor from Abnegation, and we have an Abnegation transfer this year.” She keeps her gaze on my face and raises a hand to shield her eyes from the sun. “I’m Dauntless born, so I’ve seen a lot of transfers. The one thing they all have in common is that they all feel like they need to prove that they’re really Dauntless. They see people like Eric and think they have to be the toughest, strongest, and meanest they’ve ever been, or no one will think they’ve left their old factions behind. Sometimes they go a little overboard. Seeing family on Visiting Day can bring that up.” She smiles. “Besides, you’ve clearly got his attitude. I think I’ve underestimated Abnegation all this time.”

She may not be stupid, but she’s definitely ignorant to talk about me and Caleb as though we came from a family as normal as hers. “Good for you.” I turn away.

She’s apologetic. “Whatever happened, it’s upset you. I’m sorry. But I’m sure that he still loves you.” Squinting into the distance, she says, “Looks like the train’s almost here.”

I don’t say goodbye to Shauna as I climb onto the train. Though I am exhausted, I can’t allow myself to sit on the floor. If I fall asleep and miss the station at Western I might not make it back home before Marcus.

Caleb is no longer my brother. He’s not even Caleb. For as many times as I told myself that Caleb did not owe me his choice of factions, it feels like everything I’ve endured for the past two years, the beatings and the time in the upstairs closet and the sleepless nights, has been for nothing. No, I can’t allow myself to think that. It’s selfish.

I thought that I would be satisfied with just the idea that I’d bought Caleb’s freedom with my own incarceration, but I’m not. I could accept his choosing Dauntless, but his words to me, those I cannot accept. _He_ is the selfish one for not seeing what I gave him. He was the one focused on himself, wasn’t he? He had to have made his decision to leave Abnegation before he climbed into my bed. What was he expecting from me? That I would figure it out and beg him to stay?

I would have done just that. Not for him and not for myself, but for Abnegation.

An awful voice at the back of my brain says, “But he speaks the truth. You were so focused on his future that you couldn’t see what was in his present. You were selfish, weren’t you?”

I was. I blame myself.

No.

I blame Marcus.

I did what I did for Caleb because of Marcus. If we were anyone else’s children I’d have transferred to Erudite in a heartbeat. I stayed because I thought Marcus, not Abnegation, would strip Caleb of his best qualities. I can’t agree with Caleb’s reasoning that Marcus is right, but regardless of whether I agree, it must be what he believes. I thought I was giving Caleb the chance to see his future in Abnegation by staying myself. But now Caleb is gone. Even if he weren’t, Abnegation would still be the perfect shelter for Marcus. Nothing will ever change.

Marcus needs to die.

I am shocked when I have the thought. I know the word for it, _murder_ , but I was taught in school that there hasn’t been one since the faction system was established generations ago. As shocked as I am, I am also consumed by the idea. All I can think of the rest of the way back to Abnegation are ways I could kill Marcus. Slip the rest of my pain pills into his drink. Set the house on fire while he’s asleep. Strangulation. Suffocation. Lock him in the upstairs closet for a month. Push him in front of a bus or a train. I’m all too aware of the fragilities of the human body. He exploits mine. Maybe my turn to exploit his is coming.

I force myself to rein in my thoughts. Killing Marcus might solve a problem in the short run, but I would hurt many more people in the long run. If the leader of the city council is revealed to be an abuser, Abnegation would lose the trust they’ve built all this time. I could tell someone the truth about Marcus, but I’m pretty sure no one would believe me. Marcus’s outward good deeds and his leadership have made him untouchable. Even if I did reveal the truth, Marcus’s reputation means that I would be the one hurting Abnegation. All of this is supposing that Marcus doesn’t go too far and kill me first.

I was wrong when I told that Dauntless man, Eric, that I wasn’t afraid of anything anymore. I am afraid of the part of me that can easily envision killing Marcus, the part that is all too willing to effect change with his blood. His cruelty, the way he has no remorse for what he does, the short temper, the way he can be patient with everyone but me, all of that is in me too, just under the surface.

If I can’t get past my hatred of Marcus, can I really live an unselfish life?

If my life is forfeit regardless of whether I kill Marcus or let him live, if Caleb is lost to me forever, then I have another choice to make. I can kill Marcus and give up my life to the city lawmakers, or I can live a lie, acting to myself and to all of Abnegation that Marcus is who they think he is. I could marry Susan, get out of Marcus’s house, and never interact with him again.

When I jump from the train at Western, I decide to walk home instead of taking the bus. I need some time to let my thoughts drift. Three blocks from the house, I come up with a third choice: I could leave Abnegation. I can’t risk being around Marcus too much longer. I don’t think I can hold on to my patience. My own life might not be worth much, but the life of everyone else in Abnegation is. If I’m gone, Marcus will have no one to abuse. I will never have to worry if I might someday snap and ruin the entire faction. There will be no one to reveal Marcus’s secret, accidentally or otherwise. All of Abnegation can remain safely ignorant.

The more I think on it, the more I know leaving is the right thing to do. For as much as I believe in Abnegation, I can’t stay. Even if I married Susan and somehow made a life of my own in this faction, I would always be Marcus’s son, always carry the Eaton name, the responsibility. I would always know that I am too much like Marcus and live in fear of hurting Susan. I would always have game nights with the Black family and think about Caleb. I’ll see this class of initiates through, because I made a promise, and then I’ll leave for the factionless sector. I can’t stay in what should be Caleb’s faction. I can’t face the rest of my faction knowing I keep these secrets. I would rather live on minimal food, hot in the summer and cold in the winter, than spend the rest of my life here. I’ve lasted eighteen years. I can last another six weeks.

* * *

The next few days are more or less a blur. I leave the house at the same time every day, pack and sort food and clothing, then leave for home. I avoid Susan. I make dinner every night because I don’t know what else to do. I eat, but I don’t taste anything. I do the things that are normal, even though they don’t make me feel normal.

Marcus heads for his room right after dinner one night. When he does that, he usually does not emerge until the next morning. I go into the garden. Whether it’s the knowledge that I won’t see Marcus until tomorrow or the small freedom of being outside, I breathe easier out here, even though the humidity is so high I feel like I’m breathing steam. I kneel in front of the cherry tomato plant and break off a small vine with three tomatoes and a couple of jagged leaves. I pull the tomatoes off the vine and eat them one by one, concentrating on the pop of their outer skin between my teeth, their sweet acidity. Then I crumble the leaves, hold them to my face, and inhale deeply. The smell of tomato plants is my favorite. Caleb always said I was weird for that. When I sit on my knees and close my eyes, I’m eight years old again and pulling weeds for my mother, taking time here just so I can sniff the tomato plant. I think the memory of her was what held me back from replanting the garden for so long. The pain of her loss is still there, will always be there, garden or none. But now the garden holds another warm, painful memory: Caleb pretending to help me just weeks ago, then holding the watering can over the back of my neck. I retaliated by dumping dirt on his shoes, and one thing led to another until we were wrestling, laughing so hard we could barely stand.

Everything in this garden is for Caleb.

Was for Caleb.

I want to find comfort in that memory, but I can’t. It makes me hate myself for not seeing him more clearly, for being selfish in ways I never intended. I couldn’t see what was right in front of me, that he was going to leave Abnegation. That in the end, I would be left alone with Marcus. A scream of anger builds in me. It knots the muscles in my legs, travels in a streak of fire through my gut to my chest, then feels like it’s tearing my throat in two as it leaves. I don’t care who hears me.

The fennel is the first casualty. I reach into the planter and yank it out with my bare hands. Then I squeeze the bulbs and throw them as hard as I can against our back fence. I kick over boxes of thyme and oregano. The lettuce is next to go. I pull the leaves out of the soil in clumps and throw them on the ground. Then I stomp on them. I don’t even bother uprooting the zucchini before I crush it under my feet. Trellis wires tear into my hands as I rip down vines of ivy. There’s a pot of lavender I grow for trade. I hate the smell of lavender but it’s always in demand. I pick up the pot and throw it across the yard, relishing the musical sound of breaking terra-cotta. Peas, spearmint, lemongrass, even the cherry tomatoes, I spare nothing. Within minutes, there is soil everywhere. My shirt sticks to my chest and back. Blood and dirt mix under my fingernails.

I open the door of the shed with a force that nearly takes it off its hinges. The rock salt we use on icy winter sidewalks sits in a fifty-pound bag in the corner. I carry it out to the garden and tear it open. Grains spill off the top onto the ground. I walk over the remnants of my plants and pour salt into what’s left of the dirt. When my arms get too tired to carry the entire bag, I take handfuls of salt and toss them anywhere I can reach. The cuts on my hands sting. I let myself yell out in pain and frustration. I don’t stop my destruction until I’m almost at the point of collapse. I am blind and deaf to everything except the echo of my scream and my determination to break everything in sight.

The anger that gave me strength leaves me drained in minutes. I sit on the back steps as I catch my breath, watching fireflies circle what used to be my garden. The smell of summer, grass mixed with iron, clings to my clothes. The reality of what I’ve done starts to sink in. I look at the houses on either side of mine, trying to see if the neighbors were watching me. I don’t see anyone, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t watching from a window. Marcus would have to leave his room to see me, but if he did I’m probably in for at least one broken bone. He probably wouldn’t even care about the reason I killed the garden as long as he could punish me for it. I should care about that, but I’m too exhausted right now.

Cicadas shriek from high branches. I listen and watch, feeling the tickle of sweat drying on my skin until it’s fully dark. The muscles in my arms already feel stiff. I’m going to be sore tomorrow.

Good.

I leave the mess in the garden and return inside, leaving my muddied shoes at the back door. After I shower and scrub my fingernails, I clean and bandage my hands and arms. I look like I’ve punched a brick wall. For all the scars and pain I’ve endured through the years, this will be one of the first times my wounds will be visible to everyone else. The thought makes my face hot. I did this to myself.

I could tell everyone Marcus did it. Why not deal a blow to his reputation? But I can’t get past the reason that’s held me back all these years: Abnegation depends on him too much. It’s not just his reputation, it’s theirs. Erudite is already going to spin Caleb’s leaving as a reflection on the faction. Marcus has also been careful only to bruise parts of me that are covered by my clothes. No one would believe that he of all people was capable of violence toward his children. He’s ensured that I have no one to confide in. To everyone else, he is selfless and controlled and pious. It would take an extraordinary act for anyone to believe me.

But in a few weeks, none of it will matter.


	12. Chapter 12

There is a plain white envelope under the front door when I return home on Wednesday. My name is on it. I pick it up and turn it over. No other writing or marks distinguish it. I can’t think of anyone who would need to write me a letter. It might be too much to hope that whoever delivered it knew that this was the one day of the week Marcus would be sure not to see the envelope before I did, but I hope anyway. 

I lock the front door behind me and open the envelope.

_You need to know the truth. You’ll know it soon._

The letter is typed, giving me no opportunity to recognize anyone’s handwriting. If my name weren’t so clear on the outside, I’d wonder if the note were even for me. I can’t think of any truths I need to know. No one confides in me. No one has reason to lie to me about much of anything, so who would need me to know the truth?

I hide the letter inside the sleeve of my winter coat, not risking Marcus finding it in the trash. Thoughts of it keep me awake that night, but as days pass I forget about it. If someone has a truth to reveal, it must not be that important if they’re taking this long to get it to me.

Already I’m noticing that it’s dark earlier in the evening. If Dauntless hasn’t finished their initiation by now, they will soon. I wonder if Caleb will become a part of the city patrol, or if he’ll somewhere he can use his math and computer skills.

More than this, I wonder how long it will take him to forget me. If either of us will live long enough to forget the other.

I still attend religious services every Sunday. I would have stopped going when Caleb left, but Marcus wouldn’t allow it. Most of our new initiates attend, so I reason that for the short amount of time I have left in Abnegation, I can think of my attendance as a way of supporting them. Malcolm, I notice, has taken on the role he talked about having in Candor, making sure the prayer books are available and in good condition. He waits at the entrance to the chapel on Sundays to help older members to their seats. Already he is making a life for himself here. He belongs in Abnegation in a way I never have. Never will. He makes the other initiates laugh, but he does it without making fun of anyone else. Watching him is like poking at a sore tooth. I shouldn’t, and it hurts, but I can’t stop. I see him light candles and bow his head to pray, and I hate him for not being Caleb.

I recite the faction manifesto along with everyone else during the service, adding “And only God remains,” because it’s automatic, not because I mean it. I think about that final line and start to wonder how much Marcus believes it. I think he must, because he believes in the ways of Abnegation if nothing else, and no one would fault him for not being religious. Not all families are. It makes me wonder if Marcus has been religious since he was young, or if it’s something he developed when he got older. Then I look at Malcolm and think of Caleb for the thousandth time, and my thoughts coalesce.

If Marcus has the same curse I do, is God what helps him keep it at bay? He was evasive when I asked him, and I can’t see him being anything but straightforward unless there were something he didn’t want me to know. The idea pricks like hot needles under my skin. Maybe this is part of what he meant when he said Caleb didn’t have the curse. If living free from the curse means having a little more faith, I could try that. Caleb was always faithful without question. Marcus is also the only one who knows the truth about me. And if I plan to leave Abnegation, I want to know that truth before I do.

Marcus is sitting reading a book when I approach him later that afternoon. I sit at the opposite end of the couch and take a deep breath, looking into his eyes. “I’ve been thinking about what you told me. When you said that Caleb was not cursed the way I am.”

“Yes?” His tone is suspicious. He does not like me asking questions. I should back off, but he is the only person I know who can give me the answers I want.

I haven’t quite figured out how to ask him what I want to know without stoking his anger too much. I fold my hands in my lap, squeezing my fingers together. “I thought… If you know about this curse, if…maybe you know of someone who was helped by God.”

Marcus shakes his head. “We are not having this discussion.”

“But I—”

“How dare you ask God for help when you do nothing to fix your own flaws!” I flinch at his sudden shout. “If you want to ask God to help you with your deficiencies, you can do that on your own. God sees everything. We attend those services not to better ourselves, but to learn how we can best serve others. Don’t be so selfish and take up God’s time and attention when you should be working past your shortcomings.” For a second, I think he’s going to throw his book at me.

I should shrink away from his admonishments just like he expects me to do. But I am overwhelmed with curiosity, my constant downfall. “How?” I ask. “How can I overcome my own flaws when the thing inside me that causes them might be something I can’t overcome on my own? You’re the one who called it a curse.” I stand, looking down on him, and I shout too. “What is it? Why are you so afraid of it?”

There’s a moment where I think I’ve stunned him into silence. He looks like he’s thinking, a line forming between his brows, and I feel a glimmer of hope. He will tell me now. Everything about the curse and my awareness during simulations and my always feeling so restricted by the customs of our faction will make sense. He will explain. Then I will know how to fix myself, be the person Caleb is, that I wish I could be.

The book falls to the floor when Marcus stands. Instead of talking, he takes two long steps to my end of the couch and closes his hands around my neck. I grab at his wrists, trying to pull him off, panicking that I am going to die, that this time he won’t be able to stop.

“I fear God alone, Tobias,” he says as he chokes me, “as should you. God can see your shortcomings just as easily as I can. God will judge you.” He lets me go just as I start to see black spots. I crumple back into the corner of the couch as he heads upstairs for his room. We do not talk for the rest of the day, and I am not allowed dinner. Once I’m sure Marcus is asleep, I steal bread and cheese and an apple out of the fridge.

It may be God who judges me, I think as I rub at my neck in bed later that night, but it is my father who will bring me to my end. I am not scared of dying, for whatever significance that may have. I have accepted the idea that I will most likely die young and of unnatural causes. That acceptance has brought me to a place beyond fear. I do not fear God. I can only be angry at Him, if He is real, for letting me live like this.

But there is one thing I can do. One thing to remove this constant weight of Marcus’s rage at my own imperfections. One thing that will show everyone else that Marcus Eaton is not the person they think he is, and neither am I.

* * *

Late on Tuesday afternoon, I sit at my desk, staring into the back yard. I regret destroying the garden only because I want something to do right now. I think of Malcolm’s complimenting my vegetables and wish for a minute I’d saved some plant clippings for him. Idly, I pull a book out of the stack on my desk and flip through it. It would take months of effort to rebuild the garden. I’m not sure that’s what I really want, anyway.

The plan to kill Marcus and leave Abnegation comes together all at once. The answer to everything, a solution so simple I can’t believe I hadn’t already thought of it, appears in a glossy color photograph on page fifty of _Easy-to-Grow Annuals_ : a sure, easy plan that will raise no suspicions. Most importantly, it’s a plan won’t hurt anyone but Marcus. I will grow one more plant, the last one I plan to grow for anyone in this family. I tie my shoes as fast as I can, grab my canvas shoulder bag, and head out to the shed. From a shelf, I take a pair of gloves and some clippers. I add them to my bag and start walking, keeping my eyes at the edges of yards and grassy lots. Amity won’t send what I need, but I’m not concerned. It grows wild. Shouldn’t take me very long to find.

I walk through the edge of the Abnegation sector, the sun at my back. I smile at the little kids out enjoying the warm weather, jumping rope and throwing balls back and forth. I know I’ll miss the small moments like this, watching other Abnegation enjoy simple pleasures. Selfishly, I feel sad about how I’ll never have little nieces and nephews to play with, to give advice, to slip them candy when Caleb isn’t looking. Then I stop being sentimental and get angry. I can’t blame Caleb, only Marcus. And Marcus is why I’m on this mission.

That first attempt, I run out of daylight before I have to turn around and go home. I don’t want to try searching for plants in the dark, and using a flashlight will make me look suspicious. I’ll try a different path tomorrow. After dinner, I head to my room and pull out my gardening books, just to double check that I’m looking for the right plant. I stare at pictures, memorize details, and plot a different path. I’m more likely to find what I need away from the clusters of houses, where people might recognize the plant and cut or get rid of it. There’s an old trail along Bloomingdale Avenue. Abnegation keeps it trimmed enough so people can use the sidewalk, but no one ever goes beyond the edge of it. It could be perfect.

After community service the next day, I head east. I fight my way through the edges of the overgrown trail into an equally overgrown park at Milwaukee. Stepping carefully over vines and fallen branches, I search deeper, keeping an eye out for any small flowers that are pink or red or white. I was right when I assumed it wouldn’t take me too long to find. The tall bush has thick branches, an indicator that the plant is healthy. Dark green spiky leaves dot the bush, and it bears clusters of pink flowers, each with five petals.

Oleander.

It smells surprisingly good, a little like fruit, though I don’t allow myself to get close enough for a deep inhale. Oleander is deadly poisonous and I shouldn’t get close to it without wearing safety gear. Some of the branches have seed pods, but I don’t want them. Growing from seeds would take too much time, and it’s not the right planting season anyway. I study the plant until I find greenwood. My book said the fastest way to grow oleander was to cut just below a leaf node and plant it. I pull on my gloves and tuck my sleeves into them, because handling oleander with my bare hands is dangerous. Then I snip a length of greenwood with long leaves and place it carefully in my bag. I don’t have much time before it gets dark, and I want to get back to the lit sidewalks.

I hurry home and leave my bag and gloves on the back steps before I enter the kitchen. I get through dinner with speed and silence, hoping Marcus can’t tell that I’m distracted. All I can think about is the oleander sprig in my bag and the instructions I read for planting it.

When I’ve washed and dried the last dish, I slip out the back door. There’s an extra terra-cotta pot on a shelf in the shed. I hadn’t destroyed everything in my rage, only what was outside. I bring it to the center of the yard for maximum sun exposure and add some soil. Then I pull on my gloves. As I dig into the soil with a trowel, I make myself slow down and move in time with my breaths. I want to get the plant in as fast as possible, but going too fast will make me careless, more likely to damage it. I could get another cutting of oleander, but I want to get this right on the first try. I keep my eyes on the pot in front of me and don’t allow myself to look at the rest of the garden. I hate to admit that Marcus is right. Caleb may as well be dead to me. He made it pretty clear at Dauntless that I mean nothing to him, and I have no proof he wrote that letter, only hope. But it doesn’t matter. Caleb or no Caleb, Marcus is going to get what he deserves. Revenge instead of forgiveness goes against everything I’ve ever learned in Abnegation, but given the choice between living with that guilt for the rest of my life or living a lie because of Marcus, I’ll take the guilt.

Once I’ve laid a bottom layer of soil, I add the oleander and backfill dirt around it. Everything I’ve read says oleander is best planted in the spring, but it likes hot weather. It should be ready to harvest right around the time of initiation, give or take.

My plan is simple: I’ll see the class through. The initiation ceremony will be done in the afternoon. That night, I’ll add oleander to Marcus’s dinner. With the amount I plan to use, his death will be ugly, but relatively quick. He’ll be dead before the sun rises the next day, and I’ll be long gone. I’ll lose myself among the factionless. Maybe other members of Abnegation will find the lone plant in the back yard and figure out what I did. I don’t care if they do. Now that I have this plan in place, I fear nothing.

* * *

I usually have about an hour to myself before Marcus gets home in the evenings. Not ten minutes after I walk in on Wednesday, our doorbell rings. I’m chopping vegetables in the kitchen and take a moment to put the knife down and dry my hands before answering the door.

No one is there, but there is another white envelope at my feet, my name typed on it. I pick it up, but instead of opening it I walk out the front door to the street. No one appears to be running from my door. Someone rang the bell, walked away, and blended into the other Abnegation coming home from work or community service.

Or it was delivered by someone who’s a fast enough runner to be gone by the time I could get to the door.

Someone Dauntless.

I know it’s too much to hope that Caleb would reach out to me. He made it abundantly clear that I was the reason he left Abnegation. But my hope in this moment is stronger than my loneliness.

I give up on figuring out who delivered the note and go back into the house. For a minute I think about not reading it at all. Whoever wrote the first one hasn’t done anything about it, and I have no reason to believe this one will be any different. Curiosity gets the best of me, though, and I open it.

_I’m going to fix this. I’m sorry. There’s a lot I need to tell you. I promise everything will get better soon._

The letter is typed again, but there’s only one person who would have reason to write those words to me. Maybe it wasn’t too much to hope after all. I turn the words over in my mind while I make dinner. No one but Caleb, I’m sure, has much of anything to tell me. No one else knows the reality of what goes on in my house. But why doesn’t he just do what he promises he will? I don’t understand why he sends me notes instead of talking to me.

Still, for the promise of seeing Caleb again, of talking with him and learning what he wants me to know, I’m willing to wait. At least until the oleander plant matures.


	13. Chapter 13

When I’m not guiding our new initiates on the path to becoming full members of Abnegation, I am plotting my escape. Every night, I tend the oleander plant. When I’m done, I sit in the yard and go through my plans. I’ve made a mental list of everything I need to do and pack before I leave. One item at a time, I’m stealing enough donated clothing from a mix of factions that I will blend into the factionless sector. I’ll leave Marcus’s house while it’s dark, jump onto a train, and change there. I’ve picked a new name for myself: Joshua Sandbourne. It’s a Dauntless name, and since Dauntless has the highest percentage of initiates who fail, I’m less likely to raise suspicion showing up in the factionless sector by myself. Maybe I should pierce my ear before I leave, since I have no tattoos. I’m strong enough to work in one of the factories. I can’t drive, but I could learn. Regardless of the work I find, I’ll live, and I don’t need much to get by. If nothing else, Abnegation has prepared me well for a life without luxuries.

The only thing besides initiation that keeps me from going over the edge and killing Marcus immediately is the anticipation of Caleb’s return. I don’t know what it is he has to tell me, but I’m never going to know what he wants me to know if I’m locked in a cell by the city council. Once again, I choose love over hate. I only hope I have the strength to sustain it.

Initiation is only three days from now, but lately every day has felt longer than the one before it. I’m avoiding Marcus not to keep him from hurting me, but to keep myself from killing him. I can’t wait for Caleb. If he doesn’t show himself or give me a clear explanation of what he wants in another note before initiation, I’m going through with my plan.

“Wash the dishes and get upstairs quickly,” Marcus tells me as I start to clear the table.“Two other council members are coming over tonight. You are not to be in the way.”

I put down the dirty plates. Something inside me prods a defiant answer. “What is it this time? Do I breathe too loudly and embarrass you?”

Out of the corner of my eye I see Marcus’s water glass come flying at me. I duck, and it breaks against the wall. “Clean that up,” he orders. When I stand, I find his fist aimed at my face. “You’ll keep your tongue to yourself, boy.”

His threat triggers my fight response, shattering what was left of my patience. I push him away and run into the kitchen. The large knife I use to cut vegetables is on the counter. I’ve held it for so many hours that it feels like an extension of my arm. I turn and point it at Marcus’s face, backing him into the living room. My voice is calm and steadfast. “No. This ends now.”

Marcus looks at me like he can’t believe what he’s seeing. “Tobias, what…what are you doing?”

“I am done,” I state, “with you. You are never going to hurt me again.” Every emotion I’ve hidden since Caleb left is rising. I push them all away. I have to maintain control.

He raises his hands, palms forward in a gesture of submission. “All right, everything’s all right,” he tells me. He’s using his council voice, the one that makes people trust him. I want to fall for it too, want him to be a loving father for a second before I kill him. Extending one hand, he says, “Please give me the knife. We can talk this through.”

Where was this willingness to talk things through all these years, I wonder. Except for his instructions the night before my aptitude test, I can’t recall a single time he talked to me before inflicting pain unless it was to lecture about why I deserved what it was I was about to get. For all the times he told me he hurt me for my own good, no good came of it.

“Go ahead,” I tell him, not lowering the knife. “We can talk. You start.”

When he realizes I have no intention of handing over the knife, he puts his hands up again. “I know we don’t always see eye to eye, but you’re still my son. I’m still your father. At the end of the day, we’re all we have.”

My shoulders are starting to tighten, tension creeping up to the base of my neck, but the burn in my muscles only strengthens my resolve to keep the knife on Marcus. “We used to have Caleb.” I can barely get his name out, not because I’m angry with him but because I can’t help but love him. I don’t care that he defected. I don’t care what he said to me. He’ll always be the person who stitched my wounds and inspired me to be as selfless as I could.

“I know, I know. I miss him too,” Marcus says, and I almost drop the knife in surprise. Is my threatening his life what it took for him to admit that? If he thought I’d see him as weak for saying it, he was wrong. He was far weaker to abuse and berate me, to only let me see his anger instead of his grief. Until he admitted that he missed Caleb, I believed he never thought of him at all. “And I know… I know what he meant to you,” he finishes.

That was the wrong thing for him to say. It brings back with full sound and color the memory of him beating Caleb the night before my Choosing Ceremony. “Everything,” I say, my throat tightening around the word. “He meant everything to me. And now he’s gone.”

“It’s for the best,” Marcus says. The edge of wrath I usually hear in his voice when we speak is absent. “He would have left our home as soon as he could even if he’d chosen Abnegation.”

I relax my arms, though I don’t put the knife down. “Why do you say that?”

He shakes his head, and I can tell he’s disappointed. “Because of you. He could see in you the same things I see: you’re weak, you lack faith, you're disobedient, and you lie. Nothing I could do would ever change that. He couldn’t live with you, having to look at you every day and knowing you don’t belong in this faction. You couldn’t see your own faults. You were never going to change.”

When he says that, I’m back in the hallway with Caleb at Dauntless. Marcus’s words could easily have come from him. I have to tighten my grip on the knife to keep from dropping it. I must be the only one who can’t see all those bad traits in myself, if they’re so obvious to everyone else. Caleb’s words confused me, but Marcus’s are igniting rage. If I am any of those things, it’s because of him.

“Exactly how was I supposed to change?” I ask, furious. “You’re my father! You were supposed to protect me and teach me and love me. Not hit me and lock me in a closet every time you got angry.”

“What makes you think that I haven’t been protecting you all these years?” The volume of his voice rises through his next sentence. “I’ve been protecting you from yourself!”

His words stop me. I am suddenly aware that my arms are shaking. I don’t want to stab Marcus until I know what he’s talking about, so I loosen my grip on the knife. “How… What…?”

Slowly, he lowers his hands and nods. I see relief in his expression, and resolve, but not sorrow or remorse. He is only glad that I am sparing his life in this moment. “I know you better than you know yourself, Tobias.”

I want to shout that he doesn’t know me at all, but I stop. I’ve felt the itch in my palms that makes me want to strike those who anger me. How many times did I want to yell at Caleb for sitting so passively, so patiently, as Marcus cut his hair? And how often in that bathroom did Marcus look at me over Caleb’s head, warning me with his eyes that I was not to step out of line? Marcus knew I would be aware during my aptitude test, knew that I was uncertain about what faction I would choose, and did everything he could to crush it. Me. Somehow he knows what kind of evil I carry in my soul—what other words could there be for a son who is ready to kill his own father— and my awareness during simulations is a symptom of that.

Marcus speaks like I’ve exhausted him. “Ever since you were small I’ve seen it. You have been disobedient since the day you were born. You do not have the instinct for serving others. It had to be taught. You can’t keep your curiosity to yourself. You are always in your own mind. Abnegation’s ways could not change you. No matter how much I prayed, God could not change you. I could only hope to keep your irreverence in check until you learned to serve others with pure intentions.”

In a twisted way, I start to understand him. No one is supposed to stand out in Abnegation. He is right: I am always in my own mind, looking inward while trying to fit into a faction that only accepts looking outward. I do lack faith. For all the religious services I’ve attended, I’ve only ever felt the sermons in my mind, not my heart. I was supposed to use the pain he inflicted as a reminder to think beyond myself. Instead, it became something that emptied me from the inside, an acid that ate away what little good I had in me. It only reinforced that I am someone who doesn’t belong here.

“And the curse?” I ask. “The one that makes me aware during simulations. Is that another way we’re alike?”

Slowly, he nods. “Yes. I have it, too. I know the work it takes for me to overcome it, and I don’t think you have that kind of fortitude.”

Though I wasn’t expecting him to be kind about the curse, I see him in a new way when he says that. I feel like I understand him just a little bit better. His lack of faith in me is not exactly comforting, but maybe it’s not unwarranted. Even when he told me about my aptitude test, I could tell he was trying to protect me from those who might notice my awareness. I did everything he told me, even chose the one faction that he said would be my salvation, and yet here I am.

His words reverberate in my mind: _Because I could not change you. God could not change you_. I will never be selfless enough, giving enough, good enough for Marcus. He will never stop trying to change me through violence until the day he goes too far and kills me. My decision to leave is the right one, but I can’t wait any more.


	14. Chapter 14

I raise the knife to shoulder height, keeping my eyes on his neck, right where I could cut the carotid artery. Before I can move, the front door opens. Even though no one in Abnegation locks their doors, everyone knocks first out of consideration. But whoever’s there not only doesn’t knock, they throw the door open so fast the knob bangs into the wall. The sound startles me. I look to see who’s there.

For a moment, I hardly recognize Caleb. If I didn’t know him, I’d never guess he was raised Abnegation. He’s truly Dauntless, dressed in a black t-shirt and jeans. His shoulders are broader than I remember, and the muscles in his biceps are prominent. There’s a ring at the side of his eyebrow in addition to the two through his earlobe. A tattoo wraps around one wrist. But his hair is still Abnegation short, and when his eyes widen at the sight of the knife in my hand, they’re still the same hazel as our mother’s.

“What the fuck are you doing?” he says to me, surprised. “Get over here.” He marches into the living room and shoves me behind him with such speed that I can’t even process what’s happened until I’m looking at Marcus over his shoulder. Marcus stops his pursuit of me when he sees Caleb.

“Caleb?” Marcus says in disbelief. Then he scowls. “You have no right to be here.”

“And you,” replies Caleb in a calm, even tone, “had no right to do what you did to me and Tobias.” He reaches underneath the back of his shirt and pulls a gun from his waistband, aiming it at Marcus. “Hands where I can see them,” he orders. Marcus raises them slowly, like he’s unsure if Caleb means it. Caleb keeps his voice low and says, “Tobias, I have another gun in my boot. Reach down and take it.”

“You need to get out of my house,” Marcus says. He sounds like he thinks he has control of this situation. I’m not sure if he’s acting brave or if he believes he still has any sway over Caleb. It’s clear to anyone with eyes that Caleb is fully his own person. No one has sway over him anymore. I kneel and gently lift the hem of his jeans. The gun at his ankle just about fits in my palm, and it’s surprisingly light. I thought something capable of taking a life would be heavy with its potential. “At least you were smart enough to recognize you didn’t belong here, you weak, selfish—”

“Shut up!” Caleb yells. Marcus looks almost as stunned as I am at Caleb’s outburst. “I’ll get out of your house soon enough, and Tobias is coming with me. He’s going to go upstairs and get whatever he wants to take with him. You’re going to stay right where you are. If you stay silent and don’t move, I’ll let you live. It’s more than you deserve.”

Marcus tightens his jaw. “If you kill me, that’s not just a mark on you. It’s a mark on Dauntless. You’ll be a murderer, bring down the entire faction.”

Hearing those words, that Caleb is the one who could damage his faction, ignites that same raging spark I felt when Marcus told Caleb he was selfish for letting me take his punishment. I match Caleb’s position so that both of us are aiming our guns at Marcus. He has always put faction before blood in the cruelest ways. My selfish nature has always been his excuse for what he’s done to me. Now it is my weapon to use against him. “Then Abnegation comes down with it,” I say. I hate having to say it, hate having to threaten an entire faction of people who strive to make our city a better place. But it’s the only way to get through to Marcus.

“Go get your things,” Caleb orders me, tilting his head in the direction of the stairs. His gun doesn’t move an inch. “Try to follow him and I’ll shoot you,” he says to Marcus.

I tuck the gun under the back of my shirt just like Caleb had his and run up the stairs, pleased at his confidence. Dauntless has been good for him. More than physical strength, it’s given him mental strength. I’m jealous of him, then irritated at myself for it. Jealousy has no place in a selfless life. But I don’t have time to think about that now. In my room, I throw socks and underwear and a spare shirt into my old school bag. There’s a stack of gardening books on my desk, and I smile when I see it. Some good did come of growing the extra food after all. I’m almost a little guilty about having destroyed the garden, but I have no use for it anymore. A back yard full of salted earth and one poisonous plant in a lone pot is exactly what Marcus should be left with.

Back downstairs, I look at Marcus for a minute as I join Caleb. I don’t pull my gun immediately. Instead, I think about all the things I should say if I don’t plan to see Marcus again. I should tell him that when he wakes up tomorrow in an empty house, with both his children gone and others in Abnegation wondering where I am, he will have no one but himself to blame. He won’t be able to make excuses for long. The Abnegation may be focused outward, but if one of their own goes missing without reason or notice, that could make them ask questions.

I should tell him I forgive him. That even as much as I hate him for what he did to me, did to Caleb, I understand that darkness inside that drove him to it. Because I have it too. If I refuse to forgive him, it’s like not being able to forgive myself.

Then I hear Caleb. “Are you ready?” he asks.

The entire reason he’s here, wearing black, is Marcus. I decide I’d rather live without the closure, without ever knowing the truth about the curse I carry, than tell Marcus he was right about anything. “Yes.”

“There’s one more thing I want you to know,” Caleb says to Marcus. He speaks quietly, but his stance is strong. “Tobias is a better person than I am. Every day from now on, you’re going to wake up wishing you were half as selfless as he is. If he did this, he’d regret it. But I won’t.”

I’m about to ask Caleb what he means by “did this” when he shoots Marcus in the leg. The blast from the gun makes me jump. It might be the loudest thing I’ve ever heard. When my ears stop ringing, I turn to Caleb in shock.

“Did you…” Marcus is on the floor, holding his right thigh and howling in pain. “Is he going to die?” Caleb’s bullet didn’t land anywhere near Marcus’s heart or his vital organs, but I don’t know enough to tell when other kinds of bullet wounds might be fatal.

Shaking his head, he says, “Not immediately. He might if he doesn’t get some help.”

My instinct is to run to the neighbor’s house and tell them to call for a medic. Erudite keeps a doctor at the Abnegation clinic around the clock. Caleb must read some of my intentions on my face, because he says, “No medic. I’ll leave the door open. It’s summer; people have their windows open. If someone hears him yelling, he’ll get help. Now come on. A lot of people heard that shot.”

Unable to argue with his logic, I follow Caleb down the front steps. As pleased as I am to hear that he thinks I’m a good person, I wonder if I could be as forgiving as he is, allowing Marcus the chance for someone to find him. I think about starting a fire, burning the house down around Marcus. But it’s a perfectly good house, one that could shelter other people in Abnegation. Families. Normal ones. Marcus will wake up tomorrow morning and every morning after that with two empty bedrooms and no one at the table and know that he brought that loneliness on himself. I could stay and try just as hard to change Marcus as he did to change me, but it would all be for nothing. Neither of us has the power to make the other into what he truly wishes for the other. And I am not so selfish as to think I could.

Beyond Caleb, standing on the sidewalk, there’s a Dauntless woman. She’s about my age and short, with chin-length blonde hair. A tattoo of flying birds peeks out from under her collar. “Who is that?” I ask Caleb. She looks vaguely familiar. I think I might have seen her the day I went to Dauntless.

“That’s Tris. She’s my friend. She’s here to help.” He looks to her, then hesitates before he speaks again. “Come on. We need to be gone before someone finds Marcus. I’ll explain things on the way.”

We join Tris on the sidewalk. “Are you ready?” she asks both of us.

I can’t imagine what she thinks I’ll be ready for, but I nod. Wherever she’s taking us, I’ll go. Even if she plans to dump me in the factionless sector, I’d be okay. I can never, will never, go back to Abnegation. I look in the direction of Susan’s house and almost ask Caleb if we can say goodbye to her. It would only take a minute. But that’s a minute I don’t have. Caleb is right. We need to get out of here fast. When we get to where we’re going, I can write her a letter.

Tris starts to walk away, but Caleb lingers on the sidewalk for a moment, looking back at the house. When she realizes he’s not following, she turns back and puts a hand on his shoulder. “Hey,” she says softly, “are you sure you’re all right?”

He swallows and nods. “Yeah.” Then he lets out a quick breath. “Let’s go.”

The three of us walk for a few blocks, past a small park, and I realize we’re headed in the direction of the train station. Caleb and Tris are fast, and it takes some effort for me to keep up. Once there’s a full block between us and the edge of the Abnegation sector, we slow down.

“Hey, Tris,” he says to her, “can you give us a minute?”

“Sure.” She looks around, but there’s no one anywhere. “I’ll go ahead. Meet at the station?”

“Yes. Thanks.” He gives her a small smile. Then he watches her walk away. When she’s near the end of the block, he turns to me. “There’s something I want you to know up front: Before we came here, I told Tris about Marcus,” he tells me.

“What?” I am astonished by this reveal. I’ve built my life around protecting that secret, protecting an entire _faction_ , and Caleb just went and told another Dauntless? “How? Did…” I look at Tris’s back. “Did you tell anyone else?”

“No. And I hadn’t…really meant to tell her in the first place,” he admits.

That does nothing to answer my questions. Extrapolating from the little I know about Dauntless, I ask, “Did she beat it out of you?” I feel my protective instinct toward Caleb kick in. I still have the gun. If she did anything to hurt Caleb, I’ll kill her myself. She won’t be another Marcus.

“No!” Caleb’s response is immediate. “I told you, she’s my friend. We can trust her.”

“How do you know?” The only person I’ve ever been able to trust is Caleb. Tris is a stranger to me, even if he vouches for her.

“It’ll take me some time to explain. You’re going to have to believe me for now. Can you do that?”

It’s not like I have much of a choice. “Okay. Yes.”

“I promise I’ll tell you soon. Tonight. When we get where we’re going.” He is earnest. And in all fairness to him, he’s never broken a promise to me.

Then, to my surprise, he hugs me. I stiffen and almost pull away out of instinct. He holds me tightly, though, and I let myself relax and hug him back. I hadn’t realized until now that I was starved for the company of someone I loved. I hold him with all my strength, inhaling the scents of leather and laundry detergent.

“I’m sorry,” he says as he lets me go. “I know I owe you an explanation, and you’ll get one. I was so incredibly wrong about everything. I’m going to make this up to you.”

Shaking my head, I reply, “You don’t owe me anything.”

He bites his lower lip. “If you still feel that way after tonight, then okay. For now, let’s get to the train.” When he starts walking again, I follow.

We have to be going to Dauntless. I think back to Visiting Day and realize the train isn’t going to stop there today. “I’m going to have to jump off, right?” I ask Caleb.

“Yes.” He sounds almost cheerful when he says it. “But I’ll help.”


	15. Chapter 15

True to his word, Caleb holds my bag and coaches me when we have to jump off the train. There’s a moment of terror when I take a running start and fly across the gap between the train tracks and the roof of the building, but a second after I land, I start laughing. Maybe I have a little Dauntless in me after all. Tris helps me to my feet and I brush gravel from my clothes.

“You’re not afraid of heights, are you?” she asks.

She might be Caleb’s trusted friend, but I’m not just going to admit that I am. “Would it matter if I were?”

Smiling, she nods and says, “Good response.” Caleb joins us and coaches me through the next jump. Bouncing in the net at the bottom is kind of fun, though it’s not like I can ask him if I can do it again.

“I’ll take you to my apartment,” he says once I’m back on my feet. “Do you want anything to eat? I can get us some dinner.”

I hadn’t thought about food until he said that, and I realize I’m starving. “Yes.”

“Do you want me to stay with you?” Tris asks. “I was going to meet Christina, but she’ll understand if I can’t,” she tells Caleb.

“Thanks, but I’ve got it,” he replies. I can tell there’s more he wants to say to her, something more intimate than “thanks,” and I feel awkward. I step back, giving them a little privacy.

“Okay.” They smile at each other for a minute, and I see her take his hand. Just before she leaves, she tells me, “Welcome to Dauntless.”

Caleb’s one-room apartment is sparsely furnished but clean. He tells me he’s going to the dining hall, then returns with two covered plates of food. After we eat, he tells me to relax on the couch while he washes the dishes. I realize this is the first idle night I’ve had in months, and I’m not sure what to do with my hands. I don’t feel comfortable browsing through his books. He comes away from the kitchen area with two glasses of water.

“Here,” he says, handing me a glass. “Thought you might want this.”

The water is cold, and I feel more awake after I drink it. The condensation on the outside of the glass makes my hands slippery. We sit in silence for a minute, then Caleb takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly, and starts talking.

“Do you know anything about Dauntless initiation?”

I shake my head. “I figured you probably learn to fight and shoot, but that’s about it. I never really gave it much thought.”

Caleb nods and looks down at his glass, drumming his fingers on the side of it. “There’s that, yeah. That’s phase one. The physical stage. But there’s a second stage, where you learn mental strength.”

I turn this information over in my head. I’ve always thought of mental strength as something you’re born with. “How?”

“By facing your fears. We use sims, kind of like the aptitude test. Most people have maybe twelve or so fears. You enter the sim, face one, and when you’re able to get past it or calm yourself down you go on to the next one.”

I guess that makes sense. If we get better at things like cooking by doing them repeatedly, why wouldn’t the Dauntless learn to work past their fears by repeatedly facing them? “All right.”

“And in my sim, I… I saw Marcus.” He breaks eye contact and says it like he’s ashamed. He doesn’t need to do either. I’d be more surprised if he weren’t afraid of Marcus, given what we went through.

“It’s okay,” I reassure him. “If I did the sim, I’d probably see him too.”

He shakes his head. “No,” he says emphatically. “It was worse than that. It wasn’t just Marcus. I…” He lowers his voice, like there’s someone else here and he doesn’t want them to know what he’s about to say. “In my sim, I saw Marcus kill you. He beat you to death with his bare hands. And the whole time, I stood there and couldn’t do anything. Like I was stuck to the ground. After you were dead, he disappeared, and then I was finally able to move again.”

It feels like his words have pushed all the air out of my lungs. “Caleb, I…that’s… I’m so sorry.” I’m not sure if I’m sorry because he had to witness that, even if it were only a sim, or because he had to face what I went through. To be frozen by that same terror and feeling of helplessness. Maybe I’m sorry for both.

“Shhh, wait,” he says, holding up his hand. “I’m not done. Tobias, going through that sim changed everything for me. I didn’t just see what it was like for you when Marcus hit me. I _felt_ it. And not just the physical stuff. The despair. I was…I’ve never been so scared of anything. I thought about that sim all night after I did it. It was a sim for me, but it was your life every day. That was when I realized I’d been completely wrong about you. I really did think when I transferred here that you stayed because you thought I couldn’t defend myself. But now I know that’s not true. You stayed because you’re selfless. And brave.” He looks up at me and sighs. “I wrote that first letter the next morning. I knew if I was going to be worthy of Dauntless, I had to get you out of there. Before…before it became more than just something I saw in a sim.” He flexes his fingers around his water glass. “You don’t have to be sorry for anything.”

“But I let that exact thing happen to you.” That same guilt I felt looking at him the morning of my Choosing Ceremony is back, like a stone weighing on my heart. “I’ve never forgiven myself for it, either.”

“You have to. I’m not mad at you for it. I mean, I was, but I’m not anymore. I let Marcus influence my thoughts about you because I was scared of him. I said all that stuff to you at Visiting Day because at that point, I was still in this… this fog. All I could see was my own anger. Every day, I did anything and everything I could to avoid being remembered as the Stiff. Seeing you on Visiting Day brought that up, and it was the last thing I wanted at the time. But I see now that’s part of who I am. I was so angry and confused and I took it out on you. It took me a while to see the real extent of what Marcus did.” His cheeks turn red. “The sim made me see everything so differently. I was selfish. I’m sorry.”

I can’t speak. I fear I might choke if I try to talk. I sort through everything Caleb told me. One thought crystallizes: neither Caleb nor I will ever be able to live with ourselves if we let Marcus’s monstrosity break us apart. I hold a breath until I know I can talk. Now it’s my turn to be emphatic. “No.” I set my glass down and take him by the shoulders. “Let’s make a pact. From now on, we’re not going to apologize to each other for the things Marcus did to us. We both… You have nothing to be sorry for. He did this to us. We didn’t do it to each other. I forgive you for thinking all of that. For leaving. Wanting to survive and find your own way doesn’t make you selfish. If our places were reversed, I might have done the same thing.”

“But I left you.” Pure Abnegation guilt muffles his voice.

“I know. And…” I let go of him. I want this to be the last time he feels shame about leaving. We have too much ahead of us, too many decisions to make together. Whatever our future brings, we have to be united. “You made the right choice. Not because you left home, but because you really belong here. Dauntless is supposed to protect people, and that’s exactly what you’ve done for me.” I tap the tattoo on his wrist. “And I don’t think I’d ever get up the nerve to get one of these.” He grins, and I continue. “What Marcus did to us was unforgivable. I don’t care what happens to him. But I care about what happens to you. It looks like you’re doing well here. Right?”

He nods. “Yeah. At first I wasn’t sure what I got myself into. But I’ve made friends. Tris and I… I really like her.” His eyes go a little soft when he says that. “She’s smart and brave and she really cares about this faction. About people. She helped me with my plan to get you out of Abnegation. I want to see where things go.”

“If you’re happy, then I’m happy for you,” I say. Then I yawn. “Sorry,” I tell Caleb. “It’s been a long day.”

“Yeah,” he agrees with a small smile. We both know we’ll have even more to talk about tomorrow, but right now, I’m too exhausted to think much more. “Hang on a second.” He digs through a chest of drawers in the corner near his bed and comes up with a black t-shirt and a pair of shorts. “You can sleep in these,” he tells me. “Anything else you need, you let me know.”

Fifteen minutes later, Caleb and I are both settled in his bed. It’s bigger than my bed in Abnegation, and there’s room for both of us to sleep comfortably.

“I can’t stay here in Dauntless,” I tell him.

“For tonight, you can.”

“Right, but I’ll have to come up with a solution for tomorrow.”

Caleb shrugs. “We’ll figure something out. You can stay here for at least a couple of days. I’ll deal with the other Dauntless.”

“You mean like Eric?”

He sits up and turns toward me so fast that he pulls off half the blanket. “You know Eric?” he asks, alarmed.

I chuckle. “Yes. And Shauna. I know all your friends.”

Skepticism crosses his face. “Eric is no one’s friend. He is just a straight up asshole.”

It’s still strange to hear that language out of Caleb, but I figure I’ll get used to it. “That doesn’t surprise me at all, given what happened.”

“What’d he do to you?” He’s curious. Yet another sign I missed that he didn’t really belong in Abnegation.

“Nothing worse than anything Marcus did. It was on Visiting Day. Shauna pulled him off me.”

He shakes his head. “Sorry about that. Shauna’s got a good heart, though. She’ll give you a hard time at first, but she’ll… help anyone who needs it,” he finishes, yawning. He lies down again and reaches to turn off the lamp on the bedside table.

I pull the blankets up to my shoulders and I’m maybe a minute from sleep when Caleb says, “Tobias?”

“Yes?”

“You don’t have to let me win at checkers anymore.”

I laugh, and for the first time in as long as I can remember it’s out of pure happiness. “Then enjoy losing for the rest of your life.”

_End part 1_

**Author’s note: Thanks to everyone who read! I’ve run into some issues plotting the next part of this fic (too much talking and not enough action!), so there will be a delay in posting, but I promise it’s coming.**


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